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Categories - Shopping - Free Online Business Help - Telecommunications Services Articles: Government - Ban Plastics There are other opportunities available to help us solve our energy crisis, clean up our environment, and revitalize our economy. Some of these opportunites are demanding that we take advantage of them with time being of the essence.
In an attempt to cut down on litter, Seattle, Los Angeles, and other cities and towns have implemented ordinances, which charge fines or fees for the use of plastic bags. Seattle’s ordinance also bans things like plastic trays and Styrofoam cups. Some things have been added to facilitate this like the sale of re-usable cloth bags.
The population did not demand plastic bags, trays, and cups. They were forced on us by the oil industry. Now, thanks to a lack of foresight or enlightenment by our bureaucracies, we are being forced to pay for a problem that we did not create. Instead of realizing and taking advantage of the opportunity right before their eyes, we are being blamed and penalized. Granted, we are the ones that toss the oil-based products on our roads and beeches, but only a small portion of us do that. Many of us save the bags and use them for other things around the house. Like we pay for the crimes that others commit with the establishment of prisons and law enforcement, we are being told that we have to pay for the irresponsible acts of others. We can realize that crime is going to exist and that we directly benefit from law enforcement, but, while littering is also not going to be stopped, there is another way to handle this problem so that we actually get paid for doing it.
We may cringe at the idea, but there's really no way to solve the problem except to ban things. The plastic industry in the U.S. alone is $280 billion and they are not going to go away easily. If manufacturers are fined, they will just raise prices to cover the fines and the population will still pay. If recycle centers are set up to handle them, guess who will pay for them. The ban should have enough advanced warning, perhaps a year or two, to allow manufacturers to gear up and stores to switch over.
The ban will create opportunities and technology break throughs in the lumber, paper industry, and agriculture. It will also provide a stimulus in supporting industries like farming equipment. Large farming corporations, who are in the business of getting paid to grow nothing, should be required to plant and grow trees to get their money. They will also get the revenue when the trees are harvested and as their tree farms mature and grow profitable, like Christmas Tree farms, be eventually weaned off of government subsidies. Noting that the government, in its current state, will just find another way to spend the money, it will be a token effort towards reducing the deficit and resulting inflation. Small towns, like Truman Arkansas, who lived and died with the lumber and wood furniture industry, will be revitalized. The printing industry will also benefit. Greedy bankers will make plenty of money as a result of new IPOs and loaning capital. The losers will be foreign oil.
To avoid the creation of another bureaucracy, the ban should be done at the state level and considered part of our energy plan. It should also ban things like plastic furniture, some large toys like doll houses and play houses/forts, and other items. The government can contribute by implementing the ban and by providing tax credits that facilitate new renewable energy run mills and factories. The Constitution allows them to do this in order to protect our property rights. Like wind turbine implementation, which is fast becoming a grass movement, this should remain a people’s plan in order to prevent the benefits from being taken from us by regulations implemented by special interest groups.
Making this even more urgent is the growing ocean of plastic in the Pacific. It is already twice the size of France.
All the government really has to do is ban, which is something that they like to do.
Instead of punishing all of the people for something most of them didn’t do, this should be looked at as an opportunity. We just have to be careful not to create another bureaucracy and have the results of the opportunity taken from us.
Next we should look at oil-based fabric as opposed to the cotton and wool industries.
Opportunities abound.
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