I like things made of wood and metal. In the past even speakers and sound systems were wood instead of plastic. I wouldn’t mind a sound system made of a non-conducting metal.

I used to work in a plastics place and got laid off. At first I was upset but now I realize that perhaps greater forces were at work to move me to a more desired place. I would find it more intellectually stimulating to work at a place that makes things of wood, metal, or glass than plastic. Plastic to me is boring. I usually end up breaking things I have made of plastic and if we are unlucky that it is not a recyclable plastic, it ends up in a landfull. Wood and metal are easier to repair and less likely to have to replace when you break products made of them, most metal is easy to recycle, and steel and wood break down easily in the ground.

I now work with the food industry which means greater job security and I can hold my head up high and be more proud of what I do. My starting pay is more than my ending pay at the plastics place.

Of all things that liberals, which I AM NOT, hate, WALMART is on a leading edge of sustainibility with packaging and materials its products are made of. At least paper and cardboard breaks down quickly when buried. If toxic chemicals are used in its production I am in favor of finding safer chemicals to use.

I seem to remember extreme enviromentalists pushing us to use plastic instead of paper and cardboard. The only kind of plastic I even consider acceptable for long term use would be bio-plastics. Non-toxic plastics made of oil or natural gas to get us over the hump as we do research but hopefuly more limited use.

I find silicon rubber to be very promising to replace certain items now made of plastic. I like the feel of it and the fact that it is oderless.

It is time for a paradigm shift out of what we make products and packaging out of in our modern life. No technology need be sacrificed. The core of computing is silicon, not plastic.

People who own plastics companies are not slaves to plastic. Their skill is being business men or women. That skill can be transferred to any kind of company. The man or woman who owns a plastics company need not be left out in the cold. A little sacrifice, but most have resources to absorb losses and start something new.

Some have theorized a loss of plastic would mean a loss of our technology. I strongly disagree. Regular rubber can take on many roles (a natural resource) and silicon rubber is more heat resistant and oderless.

Again, I am tired of breaking things I have to pay for so quickly that if they were wood or metal, would avoid breaking with just normal use but little but expected accidents.

I am voting with my dollars at Walmart or any other store that follows their lead. Go WALMART!

No, actually Mark Gold from Heal the Bay and Mr. Nahai hit it off. At Heal the Bay’s fundraiser this year H. David Nahai, Don Corsini, and Tom Unterman were guests of honor.

“We are proud to recognize these longtime friends of Heal the Bay for their years of public service,” said Heal the Bay president Mark Gold. “They lead by example, encouraging all of us to remain steadfast and make Earth-friendly choices in our daily lives.”

http://www.palisadespost.com/content/index.cfm?Story_ID=4192

you want new pictures of dead fish. it’s easy really. just go to Google images and type in “dead fish plastic”. yeah there were some pictures of mosh pits and other but the vast majority of the 611,000 pictures were dead fish killed by plastic.

Why consumption-driven? Because there are firms/businesses that profit based on the sale of consumable items. The market never has had, and never will have, an incentive to self-correct the harm that it does to the environment or even, really, its own consumers, because by definition, a firm (corporation) has only one incentive: to seek and increase profits to its shareholders.

Since businesses only care about profits, the only way to deal with products that have a cost to society, is to force businesses to consider thoses costs as part of their production model. This rarely, if ever, happens. That’s why there’s a concept called ‘externalities’ in economics (go here for a definition: http://sg.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20061124200246AAqJ4Ld).

So, if a business does not bear its true costs, that means you and I do, i.e., society at large. Because keep in mind, a corporation does not serve society, it serves its own bottom line.

So that leaves Government as the favored counterpoint and scapegoat in all ‘market-driven’ discussions.

But, in the U.S., at least philosophically, Government is supposed to be of, by and for the people…

In which case, if people deem that they are bearing the negative costs of single-use plastic bags, people can choose to advocate that their views be represented by their Government. This is how democracy works.

If enough people see single-use plastic bags as a scourge, then they can freely act to change that through any form of individual action: from self-selecting non-use of the offending consumable, to exercising their voting rights to advocate for broader actions that support their positions.

There are 19 billion bags used every year in CA…the BEST estimate says we recycle 5% (it is closer to 1 – 3%), that means 18.05 billion are WASTE every single year. How can any think that’s good enough? And where is the incentive for people to recycle single-use plastic bags?

Recycling is not the answer to this problem, recycling is the last refuge of the environmentally-minded; the saying is Reduce, Reuse, Recycle — in that order specifically.

An incentive to reduce consumption of these 19 billion (i.e., your goal of changing behavior), would be to associate the real costs of the use of those bags, in terms of the burden we already bear as taxpayers to clean them up.

We can do that to consumers, or to businesses — and since we are all about choice in the U.S., I say give consumers the ‘choice’ to buy one bag to use for years and years, or pay as they go for single-use bags each time they shop.

Sounds like market forces at work to me…

It’s a behavioral change that needs to take place and we can acheive this without having our government ban or tax one product. Besides, plastic bags are such a tiny fraction of the MWS.

Also, the turtle picture is totally worn out. That is the ONLY picture on the internet for the past 10 years, I’m sure you’ve heard of photoshop. That poster child doesn’t work for the general public. It’s similar to what’s happening in politics, people are beginning to see fake politicians vs real politicians.

Written from an IP that reads Commander Packaging.~ DB.