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Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

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Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#41

Post by ttehstone »

claudiulodro wrote: post #5

As an Oregonian, I think the biggest contributor is definitely bumping the redemption value from 5 cents to 10 cents. At that price, it makes it economically viable for the homeless population to spend lots of time going around and gathering every available bottle. In my neighborhood, I even have homeless people digging through my recycling bins every few hours rummaging for bottles to cash in!

I think it can eventually have some unintended consequences though. A few years back I visited Calgary and saw signs in parking lots warning people not to leave bottles in their car due to the risk of people breaking car windows just to steal bottles for their redemption value. Alberta has a 10 cent deposit for cans and bottles under 1L and 25 cent deposit for bottles over 1L. Hard to believe people would smash car windows for a couple of dollars.

Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#42

Post by vinay427 »

claudiulodro wrote: post #5

As an Oregonian, I think the biggest contributor is definitely bumping the redemption value from 5 cents to 10 cents. At that price, it makes it economically viable for the homeless population to spend lots of time going around and gathering every available bottle. In my neighborhood, I even have homeless people digging through my recycling bins every few hours rummaging for bottles to cash in!

Michigan (see link) seems to further validate that theory.

https://fox61.com/2018/05/17/connecticut-trails-other-states...

Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#43

Post by keeganjw »

blakesterz wrote: post #2

Funny, only 10 states have bottle bills: California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Oregon and Hawaii. Delaware had one but dropped it. I thought they were way more popular for some reason. Redemption rates are all above 50% I guess that's not too bad. https://fox61.com/2018/05/17/connecticut-trails-other-states...

Plus Vermont

Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#44

Post by Symbiote »

meritt wrote: post #11
claudiulodro wrote: post #5

As an Oregonian, I think the biggest contributor is definitely bumping the redemption value from 5 cents to 10 cents. At that price, it makes it economically viable for the homeless population to spend lots of time going around and gathering every available bottle. In my neighborhood, I even have homeless people digging through my recycling bins every few hours rummaging for bottles to cash in!

As a kid, I earned a considerable amount of money (sometimes $5+ per day) riding my bike around and collecting cans and bottles during the summer. Those bought me a lot of MTG cards and layaway payments on the latest SNES game. Now I just set them alongside the recycling bin for the homeless as well. I feel like the neighborhood kids are really missing out on a lucrative opportunity.

In Copenhagen, many of the public litter bins have a small shelf for donating bottles. I will hold on to a bottle for longer to put it on one of these shelves, rather than in (or beside) the bin.

Picture: https://media.mnn.com/assets/images/2015/07/KBHPant-Copenhag... ("pant" is cognate with "pawn".)

Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#45

Post by myWindoonn »

blakesterz wrote: post #2

Funny, only 10 states have bottle bills: California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Oregon and Hawaii. Delaware had one but dropped it. I thought they were way more popular for some reason. Redemption rates are all above 50% I guess that's not too bad. https://fox61.com/2018/05/17/connecticut-trails-other-states...

If one thinks about it, it's not especially surprising that the bottle bills are both uncommon and popular.

In order to have a bottle bill, a state needs to tax every bottle, convince grocers to help collect bottles, and operate recycling processors. Thus, the state's population needs to be liberal/blue/neoliberal enough on tax policy, have a strong bread basket with lots of farmers, and care for the environment.

Why do bottle bills tend to get high amounts of participation once enacted? Environmentalism is more popular than folks think. The bigger reason, though, might be that a culture of recycling has become popular. It can be easy to place a bottle into a container on the street, or for a restaurant to collect a bottle on behalf of its patrons, and those unredeemed bottles contribute to the redemption rate.

If the deposit is large enough, then a market for scavenging bottles can form, incentivizing redemption at scale, but this is usually considered a bad thing.

Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#46

Post by [deleted] »

nkurz wrote: post #9

There is fear that some significant portion of the recent increase in redemption rate may be due to fraud. Oregon recently increased the redemption from 5 cents to 10 cents, but the neighboring state of Washington still does not have a deposit. This creates an incentive for people to scavenge bottles in Washington and return them across the border in Oregon. Here's a recent article about the problem: "Oregon senator…

[deleted]

Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#47

Post by ghostly_s »

martinald wrote: post #15
claudiulodro wrote: post #5

As an Oregonian, I think the biggest contributor is definitely bumping the redemption value from 5 cents to 10 cents. At that price, it makes it economically viable for the homeless population to spend lots of time going around and gathering every available bottle. In my neighborhood, I even have homeless people digging through my recycling bins every few hours rummaging for bottles to cash in!

Is this actually a good thing? In Germany (esp Berlin) homeless people do this a lot, but I've seen them basically empty a whole trash container on the street to get a few bottles. While it's great there is a revenue source for the homeless; I can't help thinking that it's not a great way to do it. Must cost a fortune to clean up the trash after people have been through them, way more than the few (euro)cents you get…

When I was in Berlin recently it seemed ubiquitous to set redeemable bottles aside for the homeless to collect, or just hand them to homeless people directly. Seemed like only the tourists were throwing them in the trash. Not to say dumping bins doesn't happen but certaintly didn't seem like a widespread problem -- and how exactly does it cost "a fortune" to clean up a pile of trash in the street? Street cleaners are already on payroll.

Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#48

Post by LeifCarrotson »

benj111 wrote: post #40
nkurz wrote: post #9

There is fear that some significant portion of the recent increase in redemption rate may be due to fraud. Oregon recently increased the redemption from 5 cents to 10 cents, but the neighboring state of Washington still does not have a deposit. This creates an incentive for people to scavenge bottles in Washington and return them across the border in Oregon. Here's a recent article about the problem: "Oregon senator…

Is this a problem? 100% of deposits have been paid for by people. If someone else returns their bottle and the deposit payer can't be bothered, that's a win win surely.

No. They're not paid if the buyer is in a state that doesn't have a bottle deposit.

Re: Oregon Bottle Deposit System Hits 90 Percent Redemption Rate

#49

Post by closeparen »

claudiulodro wrote: post #5

As an Oregonian, I think the biggest contributor is definitely bumping the redemption value from 5 cents to 10 cents. At that price, it makes it economically viable for the homeless population to spend lots of time going around and gathering every available bottle. In my neighborhood, I even have homeless people digging through my recycling bins every few hours rummaging for bottles to cash in!

Why is it okay to pay less than minimum wage and deny benefits to what are essentially misclassified sanitation workers?
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