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Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

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Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#221

Post by rrcaptain »

woogiewonka wrote: post #151

As an individual who wants to make the biggest impact on this issue, what are my options? I am a UX/UI designer and I wonder what I could do to help rid the world of microplastics. I was thinking off the top of my head: 1. Write a letter to every company that uses exorbitant amount plastic in it's product or packaging (tons of them here in Japan) and try to make them aware of the issue (appeal through emotions - thei…

Companies won't act as long as the short to mid term profit is still with wasting plastic. Opposing the system (capitalism) as whole is the only way to prevent evironmemtal collapse.

Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#222

Post by WalterSear »

erulabs wrote: post #104
c3534l wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Taxes don't work to work to change behavior This is absolute nonsense and flies in the face of established economic theory backed up by empirical evidence. I don't understand why there are so many people in this thread pulling assertions out of their ass like this. HackerNews is better than that.

Unfortunately the planet Earth is not a laboratory, and correlation is not causation. If a tax is added to cigarettes, and the tax is passed by elected officials, and the elected officials are responding to the attitude of the populace, how do we know it was the tax, and not _the attitude of the populace_ that lead to lower cigarette usage? A classic example of this is the Civil Rights Act. Did racism become abhorren…

It became abhorrent because of the bill. The main reason that Kennedy and Johnson supported the civil rights bill was the fear of the escalating violence.

Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#223

Post by WalterSear »

rhacker wrote: post #132
mehrdadn wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Taxes don't work to work to change behavior, or people would have stopped speeding a long time ago, sugary drinks wouldn't sell in Seattle, and people would stop buying coffee in California. You do realize "work" isn't a binary thing?

Cigarettes can be an indicator: http://www.nber.org/papers/w18326 > Our evidence suggests that increases in cigarette taxes are associated with small decreases in cigarette consumption and that it will take sizable tax increases, on the order of 100%, to decrease adult smoking by as much as 5%.

Plastic isn't an addictive substance.

Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#224

Post by rrcaptain »

WalterSear wrote: post #216
ams6110 wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But who quantifies the cost of the externalities? Tons of room for political games there.

So we shouldn't try? Political games are all there is.

>Political games are all there is.

That's not true. A better world is possible, but not if we restrict ourselves to shortminded solutions like taxes and electoral politics. This is a systemic flaw, you can't work inside of the system to try to solve it.

Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#225

Post by WalterBright »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #91
robotkdick wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because plastic is so cheap, producers will pay the tax, continue using plastic, and pass the costs onto consumers. Given the higher cost of other materials, changing consumer behavior (which is not easy, but it's happening right now, and achievable through further exposure and education) may be the only way to change producers' behavior. While a tax seems like an easy fix, it may also cause the government to come to…

Simple. Raise the tax to a point that glass bottles, perhaps with deposit-return schemes, or cotton clothing is cheaper for the consumer than the synthetic equivalents. Consumers will buy far more of the now cheaper and more sustainable products and producers who continue using plastic will declare profit warnings and some will become insolvent. Isn't that's how it's supposed to work? Governments survived losing inco…

There are all kinds of alternatives to plastic. Just look at the world before 1968:

    Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you.
    Just one word.
    Benjamin: Yes, sir.
    Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
    Benjamin: Yes, I am.
    Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
    Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?
    Mr. McGuire: There's a great future in plastics.
    Think about it. Will you think about it?
For example, I just looked at my desk. There's a plastic package with 10 Dixon pencils in it. It could just as well be in a paper envelope.

Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#226

Post by rrcaptain »

CptFribble wrote: post #42
dmritard96 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. There should be a mitigation cost associated with all plastics. Nothing more frustrating than buying a container for some food that will last for millennia meanwhile the food was consumed in a couple minutes... More generally, I hope more will push for taxes on all things we want to discourage as means of weening off. Oil, coal, plastic, high impact animal products. All of them have huge external costs, none…

If we began taxing externalities to reflect actual total cost to society, consumer behavior would change real quick. My only concern is that we are too far down to rabbit hole with cheap, ubiquitous, damaging materials that if the true cost was reflected in the price no one could afford anything.

>My only concern is that we are too far down to rabbit hole with cheap, ubiquitous, damaging materials that if the true cost was reflected in the price no one could afford anything.

The reality is even worse than that: since capitalism has produced an increasingly impoverished proletariat, the cheapest most disposable goods are all that's affordable to much of the general population. We have the capability to make clothing that will last years, but we don't because it's not profitable for large corporations and the labor aristocrscy are the only ones who can afford quality goods.

We need to abolish the consumerist mindset inherent to and required by capitalism in order to save the Earth.

Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#227

Post by rrcaptain »

rhacker wrote: post #126
dflock wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A carbon tax is exactly that.

Are Carbon taxes really effective? Democrats get in, carbon taxes come with them. Republicans get in, carbon taxes leave with the democrats. I don't think taxes will ever solve this unless both sides see the issue.

The US has never had a carbon tax, what are you talking about?

Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#229

Post by rrcaptain »

erulabs wrote: post #104
c3534l wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Taxes don't work to work to change behavior This is absolute nonsense and flies in the face of established economic theory backed up by empirical evidence. I don't understand why there are so many people in this thread pulling assertions out of their ass like this. HackerNews is better than that.

Unfortunately the planet Earth is not a laboratory, and correlation is not causation. If a tax is added to cigarettes, and the tax is passed by elected officials, and the elected officials are responding to the attitude of the populace, how do we know it was the tax, and not _the attitude of the populace_ that lead to lower cigarette usage? A classic example of this is the Civil Rights Act. Did racism become abhorren…

I'm not sure what you're talking about with the Civil Rights Act because racism is very much alive today but you're very right that planet Earth is not a laboratory.

We don't have time to tinker with taxes in an attempt that we'll prevent total environmental collapse. We need radical solutions yesterday. We shouldn't restrict ourselves to thinking inside the economic system we currently have when it's the economic system we currently have that's gotten us here.

Re: Tiny Plastic Is Everywhere

#230

Post by rrcaptain »

robotkdick wrote: post #36
WalterBright wrote: post #8

Plastics should be taxed.

Because plastic is so cheap, producers will pay the tax, continue using plastic, and pass the costs onto consumers. Given the higher cost of other materials, changing consumer behavior (which is not easy, but it's happening right now, and achievable through further exposure and education) may be the only way to change producers' behavior. While a tax seems like an easy fix, it may also cause the government to come to…

>changing consumer behavior (which is not easy, but it's happening right now, and achievable through further exposure and education)

Shifting the burden of plastic waste onto consumers is extremely naive and foolish. Consumers have very little power compared to multinationals that profit greatly off of plastic waste.

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