When I order a dinner for delivery to my home, I'm likely going to use my own plates/knives. If I'm ordering via phone or pickup, I can decline the default forks/chopsticks but using the UI it's nto possible without a "comment" and some restaurants don't even read that.
Yes there's already waste in the packaging but often that's compostable these days.
From the company's perspective, though, the number of complaints from customers who didn't get ketchup, napkins, cutlery, etc. greatly exceeds the number of complaints from people who received too many extras. Given this, drivers are trained (and primed through the rating system) to grab all of the extra items they can.
Now, reducing the consumption of oil/gas could reduce plastic as a byproduct and increase costs in which case the market would self-correct.
You should also consider the unique harm plastic waste in particular does to wildlife.
My point was that if you aren't littering, then the net cost to the environment isn't such a huge thing. I'm also not a fan of government subsidies in general. Your point really isn't a subsidy, it's a means of greater use, which is generally considered a good thing. Unless you'd rather have more environmental waste that isn't used for any secondary purpose.
I'd love to see more/better efforts with regards to wildlife conservation, not littering etc. I like to do road trips while on vacation. Seeing the shear amount of litter on roadways, in the mountains and everywhere but a proper trashcan that will get disposed of reasonably is upsetting. Frankly, I think that getting society as a whole to respect their environment and other people's property (littering and vandalism) would go further to improving things than not.
Then there is the ecological issue of using and disposing of cutlery and plates after one use. Why would the harm of that need to be explained in 2019? Most household waste in the US goes to landfills.
Another issue is personal health. Plastic is continually emitting tiny amounts of toxic chemicals and leaching plasticizers and other endocrine disrupters/suspected carcinogens into the air and anything it comes into contact with. This differs from the glass and ceramic dishes that I purchase for use at home.
Seriously we (family of 5) run the dishwasher most nights - got the kids trained to do their part, so it's not much more work.
Do you like throwing away plastic wantonly?
Nevermind the trash you're promoting the production of by accumulating. You already have a reusable, probably more comfortable set of cutlery which has paid itself over a thousands times. As long as you have it, you don't need plastic stuff: no need to use it, no need to hoard it, no need to rely on it – 'cause you already have all the stuff you need at a moment's notice.
Doing the dishes is easy. The fact that I have to rack my head about which kind of plastic is reusable and which isn't, then have to separate the two – knowing that I'm throwing the kind of stuff away that will cause noticable damage to the environment when compounded per capita – seems like such a goddamn mess compared to having a ceramic plate ready for use.
There is a dishwasher but I'm using it to store post and as a wine rack.
I keep all the extra cutlery and napkins I get in a drawer and reuse them. Haven't had to buy paper towels in a long time.
True, but there's a difference between saving upwards of 30 minutes cooking time vs saving 30 seconds washing a plate...
Once, when I though that people might regularly use plastic I thought: "if that's not a mental health red flag I don't know what it is"