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The Reign of Recycling
New York Times ^ | October 3, 2015 | JOHN TIERNEY

Posted on 10/04/2015 11:43:28 AM PDT by reaganaut1

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To: lacrew

“Recyclers pay you for iron and steel too (not cans but engines and cars).”

Took a mid-sized dead lawn tractor to the recycle place. $11. That’s all!


41 posted on 10/04/2015 2:34:44 PM PDT by Dr. Bogus Pachysandra (Don't touch that thing Don't let anybody touch that thing!I'm a Doctor and I won't touch that thing!)
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To: DoughtyOne

I just finished reading Ann Coulter’s “Adios America” and what struck me is how dirty(trash wise)the Mexicans are. Here in FL I have been noticing tons of trash just thrown out of cars onto the ground,usually with a trash can a short distance away. It then struck me that they never saw the Indian crying. They don’t have any stake in this country or pride in keep common areas clean. Just toss the diaper onto the ground at Walmart and keep going. I just saw a commentary on the Muslims trashing Europe.


42 posted on 10/04/2015 2:49:48 PM PDT by happyhomemaker (Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. Rom 12:12)
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To: reaganaut1

Meh. Reusing is generally a better way to go than recycling.

Of course, there’s not really much you can do either way when you live in most condos/apartment complexes. No recycling options, and no yard to toss food compost. Either way I still toss most of it behind the bushes outside my condo, seems like that bush is growing faster than most of the others :p


43 posted on 10/04/2015 3:03:40 PM PDT by Svartalfiar
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To: Dr. Bogus Pachysandra

The last steel I sold recently was about 0.5 cents/lb.


44 posted on 10/04/2015 3:08:13 PM PDT by Clay Moore (Keep JRandomFreeper in you prayers)
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To: Dr. Bogus Pachysandra

Means your lawn tractor probably weighed around 400 lb. The price of new materials would be around $100. So that $89 gap must be larger than the sorting, transport, cutting, melting costs to make it profitable. Anyway its a 9:1 ratio. Aluminum has a much tighter ratio, around 2:1. But they both pay out money...because of authentic market drivers. Btw, steel and iron have dropped like a rock, ever since China decided to quit building empty cities. In 2007 you would have been paid $60 for that old mower.


45 posted on 10/04/2015 3:20:29 PM PDT by lacrew
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To: lacrew

I make more money with my crushed beer cans!


46 posted on 10/04/2015 3:24:14 PM PDT by Dr. Bogus Pachysandra (Don't touch that thing Don't let anybody touch that thing!I'm a Doctor and I won't touch that thing!)
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To: Dr. Bogus Pachysandra

Using todays prices, when you use and recycle aluminum products, you lose 35 cents a pound. When you use and recycle steel, you lose around 22 cents a pound. You may get paid more for aluminum, but that’s only half the equation.


47 posted on 10/04/2015 3:38:51 PM PDT by lacrew
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To: Mogger
Even if it costs a little more, it usually makes sense.

No it doesn't.

At least be honest with yourself, admit that it makes you feel better, or maybe proud because you can lord your holiness over other, less educated, individuals.

We use money as a measure of efficiency, and if it cost more, you are wasting energy to recycle. More energy than if you didn't recycle. That's wasteful.

48 posted on 10/04/2015 4:11:00 PM PDT by Balding_Eagle (The Great Wall of Trump ---- 100% sealing of the border. Coming soon.)
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To: Mogger

Regards landfills, most of the country has far more landfill space than we will use in a thousand years.


49 posted on 10/04/2015 4:12:13 PM PDT by Balding_Eagle (The Great Wall of Trump ---- 100% sealing of the border. Coming soon.)
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To: reaganaut1

Back in the early 70’s when this movement started the great thinking Marxist concluded that our trash would be so coveted that tptb would even pay us to haul our trash away.


50 posted on 10/04/2015 4:20:59 PM PDT by exPBRrat
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To: catnipman

You make it sound like recycling requires that very little money is extracted from taxpayers unwilling pockets.

That’s simply not true, it requires very large amounts of money to be confiscated from taxpayers.

The proof?

How many of the non-metal recycling efforts are operated by private enterprise unsubsidized?

Very, very few, if any. These are all government enterprises with limitless budgets, and no accountability.

Even the post up thread, I’ll wager that the company receives government assistance of some sort directly related to the recycling.

It’s very wasteful to recycle most things we throw away in our daily lives.

HELP SAVE THE EARTH...........STOP RECYCLING.


51 posted on 10/04/2015 4:22:14 PM PDT by Balding_Eagle (The Great Wall of Trump ---- 100% sealing of the border. Coming soon.)
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To: Dr. Bogus Pachysandra
Took a mid-sized dead lawn tractor to the recycle place. $11. That’s all!

Assuming they paid a fair price, and I think they actually over paid for that mower, it simply reflects how competitively efficient it is to build a new mower out of new raw materials.

Subtract the cost to get the mower to the scrapyard, probably several dollars for the gas, and your donated time, and it shows how even recycling metals is barely profitable in terms of energy in vs. energy out. Had you not recycled, a new, comparable mower, the price increase would only be $10.

52 posted on 10/04/2015 4:33:19 PM PDT by Balding_Eagle (The Great Wall of Trump ---- 100% sealing of the border. Coming soon.)
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To: reaganaut1

I don’t recycle at all. The recycling container that my little city gave me is in my garage filled with my stuff. I throw all my cans and bottles away.


53 posted on 10/04/2015 4:46:08 PM PDT by Sans-Culotte (''Political correctness is communist propaganda writ small''~ Theodore Dalrymple)
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To: tbw2
Penn and Teller’s BS (actual name of the show is the cussword) had an excellent episode on recycling’s mythos and waste a decade ago.

Yep, that was a very enlightening episode.

54 posted on 10/04/2015 4:51:50 PM PDT by jim-x (9/11/2001 - Never forget, Never forgive.)
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To: jim-x

While they cuss a lot, I showed the episode on climate / environmentalism, too to my kids. That environmentalism was eco-everything and essentially Earth worship.


55 posted on 10/04/2015 5:08:26 PM PDT by tbw2
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To: reaganaut1
If people want to recycle, as a private activity, because it makes them feel good or for whatever reason, then more power to them. Government should stay out of it, and it should not be a mandated part of municipal waste management.
56 posted on 10/04/2015 5:26:56 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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To: catnipman
Cleveland's river is doing quite nicely these days, good variety of fish, clean water. Had nothing to do with recycling.

Like you I have nothing against people recycling if they want to, but it should be completely voluntary, and understood that for the most part it has nugatory benefit.

57 posted on 10/04/2015 5:36:09 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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To: Gandalf_The_Gray
That particular problem predates recycling. I traveled western Europe in 1963 and the toilet paper then was something akin to wax paper.
58 posted on 10/04/2015 5:38:20 PM PDT by hinckley buzzard
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To: Sans-Culotte

You are a sans-culotte after my own heart.


59 posted on 10/04/2015 5:41:14 PM PDT by Bill W was a conservative (Profile, detain, interrogate, deport.)
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To: Mogger
Even if it costs a little more, it usually makes sense.

No, it doesn't.

The fact that it costs more tells us that more resources and labor will be involved in recycling the stuff than throwing it away and making new stuff from scratch.

You sound as if you just think it's a good thing without thinking about the actual costs of recycling.

60 posted on 10/04/2015 5:49:10 PM PDT by BfloGuy ( Even the opponents of Socialism are dominated by socialist ideas.)
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