Free Republic

In 2011, the Austin City Council hired two companies to handle materials. Austin Resource Recovery, headed by Bob Gedert, originally estimated an annual net income of $488,000 for the program. That estimate was based on projections of $5.25 million in annual revenue from the sale of recyclables against about $4.8 million in processing costs. In the latest fiscal year, a review of city records shows Austin got a shade under $3 million for its recyclables, even as processing costs hovered around $4.8 million. The city lost $1.9 million last fiscal year and a $2.7 million in the two previous years...

People are recycling less. In my home State of New Jersey the recycling rate for household garbage dropped for the fifth straight year in 2002, hitting 34 percent according to the most recent statistics available. Nationwide, it's the same. The national average dropped to 27 percent in 2002, the most recent year for such data. According to BioCycle Magazine and Columbia University's Earth Engineering Center, that is the lowest it has been since 1995. The justification for recycling is that it permits the reuse of things like paper, glass, aluminum and plastic. What you're not told is that it takes...