July 29, 2008
Paper or Plastic? Both 20 Cents After January 1st
From the Seattlest Flickr Pool, courtesy of Scarequotes
The Seattle City Council has overwhelmingly passed a measure to charge a 20-cent fee for every disposable bag--paper or plastic--starting January 1st, 2009. Yesterday, the council voted 6-1 in favor of the bag fee and to ban plastic foam food and drink containers.
While the City Council is calling this a euphemistic "green fee," which they hope edges people towards environmentally sustainable practices, it's really just another tax. If we were so concerned about the environmental effect of plastic bags, we'd follow San Francisco's footsteps and ban plastic bags outright. Just last week, Los Angeles' City Council approved a bill to ban plastic bags by 2010, unless the state of California implements a discussed 25-cent charge on bags. For the Seattle City Council, this is a win-win vote. They seem more environmentally responsible and get to add $3.5 million a year to the city's revenue, all without mentioning the word "tax."
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In before complainers!
Plastic bags isn't a right. We're not entitled to it. If a store wants to charge, they can. If the city wants to tax, they can. Life goes on without plastic bags.
So if anyone wants to bitch and moan about the tax, please do us a favor and read some news and realize that a 20 cent tax on some fucking bags is really the least of our issues.
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I agree Troy.
I personally think we should just get rid of them all together. San Francisco did not collapse after they banned them.
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Creating a fee is probably just an easier way to get rid of them. In Ireland, one of the first places to do something like this, when they instituted a fee, people freaked out (have you seen the comments on the PI post about this) and then plastic bag use dropped by 90% plus.
Banning bags outright would have "liberal" Seattle in much more of an uproar because they'd be told what they can and can not do. This way, they can bitch and moan now, get it out of their system and then make the choice not to use plastic anymore.
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Churchill said: "There is no such thing as a good tax"
Not a big deal though. I'll just have the clerk charge me the extra $1 for the 5 bags I use for garbage bags.
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So today the Times printed an article by one of the authors of this website - www.seattlebagtax.org - and rarely have I felt such a strong sense of "Oh my God where was this information three days ago!!!" Man I hope all the people feeling smug about the bag tax will read the reports on the site and realize they accomplished exactly nothing except establishing a scary precedent for the Council.