Recycling is not all it’s cracked up to be. It isn’t going to save our planet by itself, but it does accomplish one thing for sure: it becomes a social burden on society.
We’ve all seen people digging through trash and random dumpsters for cans and bottles. Those five cents that we couldn’t care less for (it IS why it is in the trash can to begin with) are the major source of income for these types of people. In and of itself, it isn’t necessarily something that is bad or you have to feel bad about — these people somehow make their way in life by doing what they’re doing.
What recycling does, when taking this into account is create a class of these people who do nothing with their time but scavenge and dig through trash, with little to no assurance that they will make even a dime. Imagine having to wake up in the morning everyday and go on the same route, checking the same trash cans, day in and day out. Not only because its necessary, but they have no time to do anything to get out of the situation they are in — otherwise they wouldn’t have to do what they’re doing.
States that charge recycling fees profit big time from recyclables. They use the noble cause of recycling to charge you an extra tax, a majority of which will never be recovered from recycling. People then scam the State out of these extra taxes by filling up cans and bottles with sand or something to get higher weights when redeeming their recyclables. Then the people who receive these items then scam the State even more and bump up their numbers of received recyclables for a bulk rate. Then these recyclables are sold to major vendors who ship most of their stuff to China to be processed so that it can be re-sold back to us. Don’t even worry about how most of our recyclables that we toss into the bins is basically “free” money for the waste contractors who employ hundreds of penguins to go through and get all of the recyclables they can.
But this is all very grand and elaborate. You have to go back to the people who scour the world for recyclables because they have no other forms of income. It is sad, and if recycling were abolished, then that would force people to not want to carry around 50 pound trash bags full of cans or shopping carts full of bottles. Recycling may be good for the Earth, but its bad for society.