Like most dictatorship style policies its also pointless and for theatrics only.
Perhaps Nepal could improve child mortality first even if its not hipster enough for the west.
Ireland did something similar years ago and the results were incredible. An almost overnight transformation of the cleanliness of the cities and countryside. Nobody would like to reverse the decision now despite significant opposition before-hand. Same with the smoking ban.
Are you suggesting that the issue of debate was whether it would lead to less litter? That's almost obvious, isn't it? Surely, the question must rather be whether it is morally acceptable for us to impose such a rule on other people.
Have you ever been to Kathmandu? Non-degradable rubbish is problem in many places, but I don't remember one where there would be so much of it littered on the side of roads for kilometers at end.
Yes? It's such a trivial imposition. This isn't Singapore caning people for chewing gum.
In any case, I do think that we should strive toward having just a bare minimum of laws. However, it seems to be too much fun to make laws, once you get in a position to do so, for people to abstain from it.
There is a suggestion that ultimately a bank doesn't put you in jail, where governments can do that if you continue to not pay fines. But increasingly governments take unpaid fines from income tax refunds or other mechanisms for collection rather than consider outstanding fines a criminal offense rather than civil.
That would depend entirely on whether the bank and its customer had agreed upon it before hand or not, wouldn't you say?
As far as I can see, that is orthogonal to the issue at hand.
> all this law does is to impose the costs on those who incur it.
We might consider littering to be immoral, and might therefore feel that we have a right to prohibit others from doing it, but it does not follow that we have a right to prohibit people from using, selling, owning or manufacturing bags (or fine or tax them for doing those things).
You are an individual. But you're also a member of your family, a member of your country, a member of your species, and a living creature. Your identify is not confined to your individuality. You speak English not because of your individuality, but because of your culture. It is as much a part of you as you of it.
With that said, you have a responsibility to decide what others should do. You have a responsibility to make sure those decisions are correct, and a responsibility to enforce them insofar as they are correct and such enforcement doesn't undermine our humanitarian goals. And instead of being overly-conservative in the face of the possibility that you are mistake, take comfort in knowing that experiments can fail, and that this doesn't mean they shouldn't be undertaken. Make decisions, enforce them, and if they're wrong, you change your mind later. The only alternative is stagnation or 'progress by accident'.
>In any case, I do think that we should strive toward having just a bare minimum of laws.
Why should this take priority over having the most correct laws?
When people are not considering the effects of their actions and possible harm done by them - litter, environmental - because it doesn't benefit them to do so, then it's the elected government's duty to step in and impose such rules. People have already made clear through their actions that in the absence of those rules, they won't behave on the best interests of the community.
So, do you mean that these people considered the outcome uncertain until it was tried?
Yes, the government should simply ban child mortality. Why didn't they think of something that simple? Also, until child mortality is solved, they shouldn't go after any low hanging fruit. What's the point?