(No) paper or plastic please

I made the mistake of going to Trader Joe's after work today and it was packed. Everyone who'd put off their grocery shopping over the holiday weekend was there, many with kids with no spatial awareness in tow. It was a madhouse. The lines were long so I spent several minutes with nowhere else to look but at the person in front of me. She was an older, fit woman dressed in workout clothes with an oversized green purse hanging off her shoulder. Maybe she'd just come from a yoga class because all she was buying was a Greek yogurt and an organic banana. When the cashier was done ringing her up, he asked if she wanted paper or plastic, a ridiculous question for several reasons. If you're only buying two things you don't need a giant paper bag. In fact, you don't need a bag at all. Yet she said "plastic please." I would have given her the benefit of the doubt and assumed she was walking, but she still wouldn't need a bag because she had a giant purse!

This is why we need to stop giving away bags for free. The state should pass a law requiring stores to charge for bags or ban them altogether. I haven't decided which one I think is better, but I'm leaning toward charging a fee or tax because that still gives people a choice so they can't complain about government controlling their lives. And it works, as proved by Washington, D.C. They started charging a five-cent tax for bags and drastically reduced the number used. 

This article in the Los Angeles Times looks at why California of all places has yet to pass a statewide bag ban. Only San Francisco and Malibu have bans on plastic grocery bags, even though many other cities, counties and even the state have considered them. One reason is the powerful plastic bag industry, which has been waging war against these types of laws. Among their arsenal: They claim that making paper bags releases three times as much greenhouse gases as plastic bags.

OK fine, lets assume that's true. That argument is a red herring anyway because that's not the issue. We shouldn't be using single-use bags at all, whether paper or plastic. Their life span is so short. Seriously, how much do those bags get used? A one-minute walk from the grocery store to the car, then a short drive home, followed by a brief journey into the house where the items are unloaded. And that's it, that's the life of your bag. Then off it goes, most likely into the trash. The L.A. Times article says 19 billion plastic bags are dispensed each year at supermarkets, drugstores and retailers, and that just 5 percent are recycled.

The government and individuals need to be thinking about the way we use disposable items and asking if there's a better way, instead of automatically answering "plastic please" in the checkout line. Paper or plastic? Don't forget the third option: "No thanks, I brought my own."