Posted on 10/07/2012 1:56:25 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Just over 8.5 billion recyclable cans were sold in California last year. The number redeemed for a nickel under California's recycling law: 8.3 billion.
That's a return rate of nearly 100%.
That kind of success isn't just impressive, it's unbelievable. But the recycling rate for certain plastic containers was even higher: 104%.
California's generous recycling redemption program has led to rampant fraud. Crafty entrepreneurs are driving semi-trailers full of cans from Nevada or Arizona, which don't have deposit laws, across the border and transforming their cargo into truckfuls of nickels. In addition, recyclers inside the state are claiming redemptions for the same containers several times over, or for containers that never existed.
The illicit trade is draining the state's $1.1-billion recycling fund. Government officials recently estimated the fraud at $40 million a year, and an industry expert said it could exceed $200 million. It's one reason the strapped fund paid out $100 million more in expenses last year than it took in from deposits and other sources.
"The law says California has to make it easy to recycle … so anyone with a devious mind, it's so easy, they can just go right in," said Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputy Dave Chapman, who has investigated fraud rings in recent months.
Under the state's 25-year-old recycling law, California charges consumers a deposit on most beverage containers sold within its borders. Anyone who brings empty containers back to one of about 2,300 privately run recycling centers can collect 5 cents for most cans and bottles and 10 cents for larger containers.
Only products sold in California are eligible. But a can is a can — and many recycling centers in California aren't that interested in where they come from.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
I always wonder about these programs. IF they actually recycle a can or a bottle, what does it cost to do it?
I don’t recycle anything.......
When government hands out money, this is what happens
It’s quite a story...... and then,
“This year, CalRecycle has removed 19 recycling centers from the program and launched reviews of 256 others.”
Apparently can recycling makes SOME economic sense but when government hands out cash, people are going to cheat
For God’s sake...Government get the heck out of our hair! All you can do is screw up anything you touch. Tin cans, low flow toilets and spotted owls all have proved to be a disaster along with free food, free education and free anything. Big Government GO AWAY!
Exactly!
Oh, and don't forget to put your recycle box at the curb.
In Great Britian: ....."Cornwall's verdant lanes are now becoming better known for being littered with an assortment of multi-coloured rubbish bags as the council forces residents to separate recycling into six different containers.
Richard Madeley, who has a holiday home in the area, said the system is causing his beloved corner of the county to become a "disgrace".
The television presenter is one of 250,000 households forced to laboriously separate paper into blue bags, cardboard into orange sacks, glass into a black plastic box, plastics and tin into a red bag and garden waste into a brown wheelie bin - not forgetting the black bag for ‘non-recyclable’ waste.
The 56-year-old said: "It is really awful to see all these coloured bags and boxes littering our countryside.”
Cornwall Council is just the latest local authority to introduce more separate bin collections, with some providing residents with up to nine bins, including a slop bucket for food waste, in order to boost EU-imposed recycling targets. ...."
Right. There is NO FREE LUNCH - only federal hooks in your hide (and you pay for them).
Leftwing Fascism was such a stupid choice
Bahiyah at 12:31 PM October 7, 2012
The only solution is to make recycling uniform across the land in all States. Then we’ll get truck loads of trash comming from Mexico for trade into cash.
This is nothing new...on an episode of Seinfeld, Newman & Cramer borrowed a US Postal van to take a truck-load of 5 cent New York cans to Michigan to collect 10 cents apiece that Michigan pays for returns!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1blsZxXDCU
I remember that, lol.
I bet there are people who try that on a bigger scale
How long until this is deemed a felony?
How long until this is deemed a felony?
What government program that spends taxpayers money buying something is not just rife with fraud but ripe for it? Zero, zilch, none.
And today, is there any reason for government recycling, if, “used” plastics and aluminum ARE economically efficient for container makers to use? And if so, then isn’t it worth it for commercial recyclers to buy it, themselves, and wouldn’t they do a better job than the government at insuring THEY were not defrauded.
What is it that government takers of the used platic and aluminum do? Don’t they just sell it to the actual industrial users of it?
Why not let the packaging industry run the “recycling” programs, offering their own rewards for used plastic and aluminum - and get the government and taxes out of it.
Newman is probably already in prison for his postal felony...LOL
To help identify people bringing cans into California, Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law last month that will require those importing more than 25 pounds of aluminum or plastic or 250 pounds of glass to declare at the border what their purpose is and the source and destination of the material.
We have a couple who moved here from California and they save cans and when they visit California it pays for their trip.
Kramer and Newman at it again?
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