NJ's Plastic Bag Ban Backfires Horribly

The NJ bag law seems to be less than two years old. And comes at the tail of a worldwide pandemic when people’s habits changed drastically. I look forward to seeing a similar study in ~3 more years. I suspect that the situation will improve.

My experience is that it took me a while to get used to using reusable bags, though this was long before any bag banning discussions were truly being held (outside of niche groups) and therefore the consequences of forgetting bags was much lower (I’d just get a single use thin plastic or paper bag). But I got there and now only forget if my trip is unintended.

As the article notes, delivery and curbside pick up end up giving you new bags each time. There is certainly room for improvement here. I was using a delivery service that took back their (cloth) bags. I’ve even used some that offer refunds per bag exchanged.

One thing that stood out as slightly absurd to me from this article:

> Many consumers likely determine it’s safer to pitch their reusable bags after a few uses rather than risk getting sick. And while some might clean their bags over and over to keep using them, perhaps more shoppers determine it’s not worth their time and energy.

This seems pretty unlikely to me. I doubt the vast majority don’t thing about or care about this. My observation is that people, in general, don’t think about things being germ-laden without them being visibly dirty.

“Don’t always assume that reusable is the best option,” - For example, stainless steel bottles. Stainless steel can leach metals, such as nickel and chromium, into your water. While the amount of metal that leaches is usually small and considered safe, people with nickel allergies or other health concerns may want to avoid using stainless steel bottles.

So basically New Jersey made the mistake of pushing people to Poly bags instead of Cloth bags. That problem is easily remedied. Ignoring the fact that the site is basically saying that in the short-term CO2 output is increased because re-usable bags are more energy intensive than ones you use once and toss (this isn't a surprise to anyone). As for "the existing bags can be recycled" - sure, and I'm willing to bet less than 1% of people recycle their plastic grocery bags.

I'm shocked a "conservative libertarian" site is recommending we keep trudging headlong down the path of using disposable items that constantly have to be repurchased en lieu of re-usable alternatives.