A new survey of California voters found that 71 percent support key policies of a 2020 ballot initiative to tax plastic manufacturers, officials with San Francisco-based Recology said.
The “California Recycling and Plastics Pollution Reduction Act of 2020” would assess a fee of up to 1 cent per plastic package. The fee could be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices.
Caryl Hart and Linda Escalante, two commissioners with the California Coastal Commission, and Recology’s president and CEO Mike Sangiacomo filed the initiative with the state attorney general’s office.
Money from the fee would go toward environmental restoration and improving recycling infrastructure.
Eric Potashner, vice president of strategic affairs at Recology, said the company needs at least one optical scanner and machine learning technology so its machines can do a better job of separating recycling from landfill materials.
The measure would also ban the distribution of Styrofoam by food vendors and require all packaging be compostable, reusable or recyclable by 2030. It would also give CalRecycle the ability to reduce plastic packaging and single-use plastic products through regulations.
CalRecycle administers and oversees California’s state-managed recycling programs and non-hazardous waste handling.
The survey also found that 51 percent strongly favor the initiative while 20 percent somewhat favor it. Twenty-four percent oppose the measure.
The margin of error for the survey is plus or minus 3.5 percent. Researchers used a 95 percent confidence interval.
The survey was conducted between June 6 and June 13, 2019.
Voters were asked, “Do you favor or oppose a proposal to reduce the use of packaging that cannot be recycled and generate funding for maintaining and expanding recycling, composting and beach clean-ups by charging manufacturers 1 cent for every item they sell in California with disposable packaging that cannot be recycled?”
Potashner said Recology can find a home for recycling rigid plastics such as detergent bottles. But film plastics such as plastic bags are not recyclable with current technology. So they end up in the landfill or some firms burn the film plastic.
Plastics harm marine wildlife and more recently it’s become clear that people are ingesting microplastics.
“We’re ingesting a lot of microplastics,” Potashner said.
Microplastics are also showing up in snow and rainwater in the Rocky Mountains.
Not all is lost though. Potashner said 85 to 90 percent of what ends up in Recology’s blue recycling bins is recyclable. About half of what is not is film plastic.
Consumers should be charged upfront for the eventual costs on the backend of products.
Only once the true cost/impact of products is realized by consumers (by paying for it upfront) can rational purchasing decisions be made in a free market economy.
“… a fee of up to 1 cent per plastic package. The fee could be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices.”
AND, “… would also give CalRecycle the ability to reduce plastic packaging and single-use plastic products through regulations.”
Increasing what unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats are able to regulate and mandate, to make up possibly any regulation they happen to dream up. Guessing consumers and state legislature would have little to ZERO say in what they mandate.
Just guessing here, those in favor will spend 8 to 17 Million dollars to CON micro second attention span voters into passing.
Would be interested to learn what their survey sample size was.
Exactly how many people did they ask ? ? ? ? ?
Population of CA is roughly 40 Million people.
Well said, OG. Paying more to give bureaucrats more control over our lives….(Deep sigh).
But the pros do not need to “con” the CA voter. A huge chunk believe the B.S. and will drink the Kool-Aid until they drown. These are the same knuckleheads who vote for sales tax increases.
Vote no on any new tax, fee, bond, or levy until the government can show some good judgement and restraint.
I wish I kept my statistics notebooks from the classes.
To be +-3% with a 95 percent confidence interval.I remember requires around 1100-1300 truly random people.
Professor – you’re expecting the government to show some “good judgment and restraint?”
Sorry – I just blew that coffee outta my nose.
Taxation just doesn’t work well. The money seems to always go somewhere else. Indeed, we don’t need more plastics on the earth but there must be a better way than to tax us directly or indirectly. TEA
Taxation works very well when the tax is high enough to change behavior. But 1 cent will NOT change the buying habits of the public. If they make the tax high enough to hurt the public’s wallet, then the people will squawk and the measure will fail the vote. This is why they keep the initial tax low. And, they will raise the tax sometime in the future.
This is nothing more than a power grab with a pot of gold for the government to waste.
Then put a five dollar tax on each cup or straw and lets be done with it.
The Professor correctly points out that once a tax begins, the tax will be raised after passing with an artificially low rate to get voter approval.
Once passed, many (majority?) will not pay attention to the effects of the tax levied, and when the call to raise the tax to accomplish said goals emerges, voters fall asleep.
The state has a surplus of about 22 Billion in their “rainy day” fund.
Take it out of that fund.
NO MORE TAXES!!!
Foonman is right.
Aside from taxing the industry as a whole. Education needs to be stepped up a notch. No more cd cases is fine.
Sustainable alternatives seems the best approach. How can we avoid creating plastics to begin with??
I seem to recall a number of biochemical formulas that could pass the litmus test here.
71% Of State’s Voters Support Tax on Air as well
Well said…
Probably the same 71% that voted for pos Newsom.
We all pay a fee upfront to recycle cans and bottles. The only reason this fee hasn’t been applied to plastic containers in my opinion is that plastic comes from petroleum and big oil doesn’t want any fees to affect their profits. We need to put some money towards this problem. I saw a news story that Recology sends our plastic to China to be recycled yet 7 of the 10 rivers in the world putting the most plastic into the oceans are located in China. Seems like sending our plastics to them for “recycling” isn’t working so if we have to pay a tax to get it properly handled here then so be it. Sounds like a great industry to create jobs.
No more Taxes !
Amen… just another tax Newsome will convert to general fund just like the gas tax.
I don’t trust surveys.
It’s much like;
Figures don’t lie but liars figure.
Taxing corporations is simply taxing yourself, consumers always pay.
The money taxed won’t go to what it’s supposed to, it never does.
CA needs new and better representatives.
Every citizen should spend a year as the representative of their home district, one and done.
total BS.. money in YOUR pockets.. enough already
Ah, so language in the poll was misleading and now we are being asked to pay more in taxes to help a private company improve their infrastructure? GTFO.
They already don’t make it easy to rebate the deposits we have to pay. They also charge any rebate we do get as taxable income. We already pay taxes on everything we buy one way or another.
No new takes.
The fee could be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices.
The survey was conducted between June 6 and June 13, 2019.
yeah plenty of time to collect dem votes out side of a union hall
I wonder if they were told the tax would of course be passed on to them in higher prices
as well as the gov taking control of yet another commodity like pge and water as well as garbage and police
yet of course the lemmings just keep voting the same and passing tax hikes and fees
Just a thought:
CA Has a democratic supermajority and Democrat controlled executive branch. That means they can (and do) raise taxes on anything and everything because they have the required 2/3rd majority.
But
I bet they tried getting this through the Legislature, and must have failed, if they are now going the Proposition route.
Makes one ponder how bad of a bill it is if the tax & regulation happy legislature turned them down………
Never been contacted for any survey in over 4 decades, and who did this survey and validated its claims. Wake up California voters and stop taxing everything to death because it’s just passed on to the consumer. Remember that when it comes time for Bond measures at election time too. It seems that there are too many financially illiterate voters in CA. High taxes harm people!!!
I understand how surveys work. You take a survey and if you don’t what you want, you reword the survey until its what you want to claim. Or keep on changing the wording until desired result comes in. Then publish it. Don’t ever believe what you see.
Another tax that will never go towards what it says it will go towards. If consumers want to stop the use of plastics quit buying them. I always preferred reusable bottles.
Californians and Democrats elected to office have never met a tax they didn’t like.
The feel good green crowd should be careful what they wish for. So many things are mad with plastics you cannot think of them all.
Economics 101 at Del Valle High School, Sophmore Year
“Corporations do not pay taxes. they simply do one or more of the following: pass the cost on to the consumers, cut payroll and demand more work from their employees, close up shop. Communist China is probably “shaking in their boots” with joy knowing that United States plastic producers will face even higher taxes, while Chinese manufactures enjoy even more income revenue and slave-wage labor.
As a native Californian, not only do I support no new taxes, I believe the state needs to roll back 50% of the ones it’s got, tighten its belt, and reorder its priorities. The city, county, and state government keep piling bad ideas on top of bad ideas and look where it’s gotten us. No new taxes.
Nothing more despicable than a person who will vote for a tax on someone else.
I was not asked my opinion on yet another tax that is driving us California natives to leave. I am against this as we are taxed to simply breath it seems. NO!
Yes, taxes, taxes, taxes…the answer to everything.
Adding this tax to the price of a car, which has a lot of plastic, will make them almost non affordable
1% on 50k is $500. Don’t think that will stop anyone.
I didn’t vote on this, I didn’t agree to this, and no one asked my opinion.
so kiss off
Boycott plastics and you won’t pay.
California is too crowded. Taxes cannot be high enough!
How about we go back to glass and paper products instead of plastics. Use our good old American know how and invent products that are not plastic. But no more taxes.
BOHICA!!! (Bend Over, Here It Comes Again!)
Enough of these stupid taxes telling us how to live our lives. Everything costs too much already.