When life gets down to the lowest common denominator in simplicity, garbage SHOULD tend to also diminish. - Much of our garbage now is elaborate packaging, and for many newspapers and magazines - which should also diminish. (We take our old newspaper stacks to a local auction house for people to use for packing material for their purchases.)
When I was a kid, garbage was real sparse. Meat packages were either simple or just plain burnable butcher’s paper. We used few tin cans and glass jars. Daddy burned our trash in a big old metal barrel. We didn’t get newspapers much. Fast food was limited to a local Dairy Queen ice cream cone every now and then. Didn’t have paper towels or paper napkins and toilet paper (used Sears & Roebuck’s catalogs).
“... and toilet paper (used Sears & Roebuck’s catalogs).”
No more Sears catalogs. I keep large phone books in case toilet paper runs out.