re·cy·cling [ree-sahy-kling]
- Exerting extra time and effort to assuage personal guilt about a phony, trumped up environmental crisis.
- A way to show how ‘in-touch’ you are with the environment, even though it doesn’t make much of a difference.
- Spending millions in tax dollars to fund yet another wasteful government agency.
As I’m sure you can tell by my opening, I’m no fan of recycling, especially state-enforced recycling. I live in a typical American town. And in this town, the local government has decided that we must all recycle, therefore, they’ve issued state approved waste receptacles (trash cans), one brown for garbage, one blue for recyclables.
Now, if you just stop to think about this for more than one minute, and have a modicum of economic understanding, you’d realize that this is a paramount waste of time and money, and actually may do more harm to the environment than good.
You see, for the thousands of municipalities across the country that forces participation in these recycling programs, they spend countless tax dollars and resources trying to “do the right thing”. All those special recycling trucks, all those special recycling receptacles, all those special sorting facilities, all those employees, all that fuel, all that electricity. You get the picture.
In the end, are you really saving the environment at all? Not really, but it sure feels good!
The free market is an awesome and incredibly inventive system. The market will tell you what’s worth recycling and what’s not. Aluminium, copper, other heavy metals, cell phones and other electronics, furniture, used cars, etc. are all worth more money recycled versus being thrown away.
But when government gets involved, not only do you lose freedom, but efficiency goes out the windows. Are you aware of any government program or agency that’s run better than it’s free market alternative? Hell no, everything with government does costs more and involves more waste (pardon the pun).
So I say throw that plastic milk jug right in the garbage, along with your glass jars, old newspapers and egg shells, all knowing that the free market will provide a fresh supply of these items at your local market, and at affordable price! Oh, and the environment? Just remember that forced recycling isn’t really helping at all.
,