Question by fixn2rock: Why are we not recycling a lot more of our waste than we are?
Are there programs set up to accept a recyclable item that some one has found on the street. (paper, plastic, glass, aluminum, copper, and the list goes on). So much of what is thrown away and sets in land fill space could be recycled. If we recycled everything we could think of how much smaller our landfill space would be.
Here’s an idea, “have recycling programs that accepts everything recyclable. And pay the homeless people on the street to collect and return recyclable items to the collection center.Sounds like a pretty good deal to me. The homeless get paid for doing something and we get a clean city. And our landfills are smaller.
Best answer:
Answer by doodlebug
i think one of the reason is because there are no recycling facilities that are close in the area,
i wish ppl recycled more too, and everything u said sound like a great idea,
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
People do not want to clutter their houses with 10 different bins to collect the recyclables they just throw it in the trash..homeless cleaning up how about have people on welfare that ARE able to work clean up our streets and creeks?? make it mandatory that they work at least 20 hours a week to receive their free check that is coming out of OUR hard earned paycheck??just a thought..also we DO need more areas that provide containers for recycling-this type of service should be at every employer and free for the employer to do so..some places charge an employer to pick up..with all the vending machienes around all of our plastic bottles go right into the trash..
Some local authorities have placed recycling banks next to litter bins in town centres. This would seem to catch drinks cans and bottles, but is open to abuse by contamination with other litter.
The best way to make sure your own litter gets recycled is by not putting it in a bin, take it home and recycle it.
Every so often I may eat at McD’s or Subway. I make a point of folding up my used packing including the paper tray liner and taking it away with me to recycle. As consumers I feel that we should take responsiblity for what we use and dispose of ourselves. In business this can be called a duty of care.
Recycle, if you can, then you should.
The problem is that their isn’t a real incentive for recycling goods from the consumer standpoint, aside from social conscience. People should probably do it regardless, but you are not going to make it a priority unless you use either a “carrot or a stick.”
As for the homeless idea, I think it is a good idea in theory, but falls short applying it to reality.
Imagine the homeless going through peoples garbage on pick up day. You are going to end up with alot of upset home owners to say the least. Not to mention what the gun toting variety will end up doing finding some dirty stranger on their property.
Three little words:
“Where facilities exist”
In Vancouver in Canada (where I live) there is a “recycling deposit” charged on everything the city council recycles.
However, it’s only about five cents a can, and you have to go collect everything up and take it back to the supermarket, and then wait in a special cue etc….so basically, all the cans get thrown in the bin and the local homeless collect them up and collect the fee.
So this is pretty much what you suggested, although it has not been extended much beyond paper cans, and plastic bottles.
I think any idea that perpetuates the gulf between peoples actions and thier resposibility for them is worse than useless.
The mantra is “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” It is in order of preference, recycling being the least desireable, but better than nothing.
I also note you have never been ‘domesticly challenged’.
Brian, ‘landfill mining’ already exists, it is normaly used to recover landfil sites for major engineering projects, such as motorways. It is expected to be used for resource retrieval when economically viable.
well, first of all, we should not pay homeless people to do anything. they really wouldnt mind staying homeless then. and the streets would not become cleaner, the opposite in fact.
i see homeless people go through garbage all the time, looking for bottles/ whatever else. now imagine them doing that en masse for everything recyclable. it would be a disaster.
so that on top of the garbage and filth already in the streets, and we would have some major problems.
there are several sites around the world where garbage IS being recycled on a grand scale. on the ‘dirty jobs’ show, the guy went to this plant that takes almost anything and breaks it down into either raw materials or turns back into clean energy. it was so great.
the short answer is- the technology is still too expensive and/or not fully developed. i mean, wouldnt you LOVE to have doc browns MR FUSION on the back of your car? and just throw garbage into it to make it run?
at this point, it is cheaper to import the crude oil, the plastics and papers and metals and produce cheap product.
imagine a day, maybe 75 or 100 years from now when we are paying people in sealed suits to go through our massive garbage dumps and pull out plastics, metals, etc. to process.
People are lazy and recycling costs time and money. Simple as that. A lot of money has to be put into an efficient recycling program that goverments aren’t overly willing to dish out. Look at the Kyoto agreement and how that’s going over.
For now, in most places, it’s every man for himself.
However, there are a few cities that do have recycling programs. Ottawa, for example, used to provide homes with blue recycling bins to be placed by their garbage cans, and recycling trucks would come by and take them away on garbage day. But, as mentioned, something like that takes a lot of government/municipal financial support.
As for paying the homelss to do these things, we already do. the majority of recycling places that I’ve seen give you a couple cents per bottle or can you return to them. So, we already give out a small profit to those willing to do their part. However, you must see why these jobs can’t be given to the homless exclusively. That would be discrimination based on income. However, there is nothing wrong with a homeless person applying for a job at a recycling plant and working there for a wage.
Americans are in general lazy, some would rather live on the streets in poverty than to work a job that they feel is beneath them. When I lived in Germany they wouldn’t pick up your trash unless you separated out the recyclables, it would be nice if we had a program like that here.
Apathy for the most part. People don’t really care, and the recyclables which have been picked up, most likely were discarded in landfills instead of being put to good use.