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EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

environment.ec.europa.eu

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Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#741

Post by gadders »

miki123211 wrote: post #373
motbus3 wrote: post #204

I'm reading the comments and I get confused. I kinda think this is a good idea and it is not like the government is purely making it a 3rd party problem only. This might make production more complicated for a while, but nowadays it is much easier to predict demand and produce quicker in smaller batches. In the 90s you might need change a whole factory setting for every single piece of fabric but nowadays it is that m…

Here's how this law is actually going to work. Instead of destroying the unsold clothes in Europe, manufacturers are going to sell them to "resale" companies in countries with little respect for the rule of law, mostly in Africa or Asia. Those companies will then destroy those clothes, reporting them as sold to consumers. So instead of destroying those clothes in Europe, we'll just add an unnecessary shipping step to…

Or they could sell them in Africa, driving local producers out of business

Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#742

Post by Atreiden »

quotemstr wrote: post #644
joe_the_user wrote: post #637

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think that what's cost effective (in terms of money, of course) for a given company involves optimally conserving resources? The obvious counter-example is that polluting is very cost-effective in an unregulated environment there are others - such as this.

> What makes you think that what's cost effective...involves optimally conserving resources The words "cost" and "effective "perhaps? > Polluting Pollution is an economic externality. If I buy a shift and throw it out unworn, I've wasted only my own resources. (I'm paying for the landfill of course.) You could argue that my wasting that shirt hurt you because I could have instead spent those resources on productive a…

Are you under the impression that the planet has effectively infinite carrying capacity and ability to support an "optimal market" indefinitely?

Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#743

Post by dangus »

miki123211 wrote: post #373
motbus3 wrote: post #204

I'm reading the comments and I get confused. I kinda think this is a good idea and it is not like the government is purely making it a 3rd party problem only. This might make production more complicated for a while, but nowadays it is much easier to predict demand and produce quicker in smaller batches. In the 90s you might need change a whole factory setting for every single piece of fabric but nowadays it is that m…

Here's how this law is actually going to work. Instead of destroying the unsold clothes in Europe, manufacturers are going to sell them to "resale" companies in countries with little respect for the rule of law, mostly in Africa or Asia. Those companies will then destroy those clothes, reporting them as sold to consumers. So instead of destroying those clothes in Europe, we'll just add an unnecessary shipping step to…

It seems like your view boils down to “why bother trying to regulate businesses when they’ll just be evil anyway?”

Well, they’re guaranteed to be evil without regulations.

Any flaws with the regulation can be worked out and adjusted in the future. These things are not set in stone forever.

Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#744

Post by boxed »

hilbert42 wrote: post #617
miki123211 wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's how this law is actually going to work. Instead of destroying the unsold clothes in Europe, manufacturers are going to sell them to "resale" companies in countries with little respect for the rule of law, mostly in Africa or Asia. Those companies will then destroy those clothes, reporting them as sold to consumers. So instead of destroying those clothes in Europe, we'll just add an unnecessary shipping step to…

"So instead of destroying those clothes in Europe, we'll just add an unnecessary shipping step to the process, producing tons of unnecessary CO2." The world being as it is you're likely correct and your cynicism makes sense, but I'd like to think somehow you're wrong. That EU regulators actually saw need for such regulations makes me both sad and annoyed because they ought not be necessary. What's wrong with clothing…

> What upsets me so much about this unnecessary waste is that when I was a kid clothes were expensive

Clothes used to be more expensive and that makes you upset now?

But go back before the mechanized loom to see ACTUAL expensive clothing. When people were robbed, they literally took their clothes. People were murdered for the clothes they wore.

Now let's rethink this. Should you be angry that you didn't get beaten for destroying your clothing when you were a kid, because actually clothing was insanely cheap compared to pre-industrial ages? No, we should know our history and be glad that things are cheaper now.

Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#745

Post by bonzini »

wedog6 wrote: post #653
nerdsniper wrote: post #584

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Outside of a few very rare circumstances, that’s not what “sell” means. 99.9999999999% of the time, “selling for a negative price” is more accurately called “buying”.

Selling for a negative price is completely different from buying, because the flow of 'goods' is in the other direction.

You're buying a service, and the service is getting rid of goods.

Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#747

Post by acdha »

buckle8017 wrote: post #544
acdha wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not hard to mark things as defective, liquidated, etc. so those eBay sellers can face fraud charges. We shouldn’t be sending stuff to landfills just to save a few pennies in permanent marker.

fraud charges for ebay sellers over stating the condition of their items? hilarious fantasy

There are people in jail for this right now who presumably don’t find it funny, and in this scenario the volume would be high enough that prosecutors would definitely be interested.

Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#748

Post by wolvoleo »

Nevermark wrote: post #674
hilbert42 wrote: post #643

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Asking/convincing companies or individuals to be voluntarily ethical, one at a time, is not a solution. ...just increases the opportunity, profits and incentives for less-altruistic actors." Exactly, it's why we need to reintroduce regulations many of which were removed or weakened from the late 1970s onward. Moreover, we need intelligent regulation not just gut reaction to an immediate problem. That's proving much…

> we need intelligent regulation Absolutely. Poorly thought out, too strict, performative, or obsolete regulations create opposition for any regulation. I also think we need to co-opt the “enemy” to be regulated, in their terms. E.g. get all the major fossil fuel CFO’s in a room, and figure out the financials encouraging green energy, and away from polluting and geopolitically complicated energy, that would make cold…

> include and involve the military, insurance giants, large food security/supply chain companies like Cargill, reactor companies, big enterprise customers that want rapid energy growth, and all the other major sectors that take climate change and energy expansion seriously and will get value out of a more stable world, with better energy technology in practical terms. The people that CEOs respect

Oh yeah let the corpos and MIC rule the world even more than they already do, great idea :)

We should really reform the "free market" IMO. It is way too free now. They get all the benefits and none of the responsibilities.

Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#749

Post by dollylambda »

imtringued wrote: post #698
dollylambda wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This feels like the argument for why not deflationary currency. Said another way, I have a property worth X, but next year it will be worth more because money is deflationary. Why would I want to sell my house this year when I can wait until next year to sell my house and get more money.

Deflationary currency is like a highway that you're allowed to park on. People will park their car on the highways and then charge you a fee to let you through. >Said another way, I have a property worth X, but next year it will be worth more because money is deflationary. Uhm, if money is deflationary, your house will be worth less than X denominated in the deflationary currency. This means if the money grows in val…

Yeah, I had it swapped around. "Said another way, I have a property worth X, but next year it will be worth more because money is inflationary."

Re: EU bans the destruction of unsold apparel, clothing, accessories and footwear

#750

Post by kapep »

epolanski wrote: post #549
tjwebbnorfolk wrote: post #453

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One man's trash is another man's treasure. They will be able to sell them for pennies on the dollar so that some fraction of them can be resold for cheap in Africa or somewhere else poor. Those companies can then dispose of them however they wish. The reseller makes a small profit, and the original moanufacturer gets the PR of "clothing the poor" or whatever. And, as usual, EU regulations achieve absolutely nothing -…

1. Modern clothing is terrible, plastic filled, hardly resists multiple washings. This isn't the 1990s/2000s anymore where you could buy mid budged solid apparel and keep it forever. The gold existed, up to pre COVID. But since then and the rapid spread of fast fashion collecting cloth wastes is a bad business. 2. The market for vintage quality clothing is super strong and booming. You don't need to export it. 3. No…

> 2. The market for vintage quality clothing is super strong and booming. You don't need to export it.

The market for regular second-hand clothes is on the verge of collapsing in Germany though. Charities are flooded with low quality and unsalable stuff ever since it was made illegal to throw away clothes in the regular trash. You must bring them to recycling facilities instead now. It not profitable for charities to sort through them because of the volume. There is a market for quality vintage clothes but that's a totally different thing.

> 3. No fashion brand wants to be anywhere near associated to clothing the poor. It's a pr disaster.

That's probably the only thing that motivates brands not to overproduce. But lets be real, they will rather find loopholes for destroying them instead of selling them for cheap.

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