First of all, the article ignores one key point. Items that are recycled don not have to be disposed of, which also costs money. When my former suburban NY town voted for full, mandatory, recycling...which also involved the residents separating into paper, plastic, metals, and other..which meant everyone had to have FOUR containers..after one year..our annual cartage bill...what we paid to the the county incinerator to burn our trash...was cut in half..We opened a recycling center..staffed by volunteers..and aside what we earned for the bulk recyclables, we also collected old computers, phones..electronic stuff..which we sold in bulk..I assume it ultimately went to the far east where they extracted the precious metals. Our annual trash bill was almost zero.