This is the problem with knee-jerk reactions. Or the need for politicians or people in general to "do something" about a perceived problem. So much effort is put into just getting something done as quickly as possible once such a problem is identified that more often than not, nobody bothers to analyze exactly what the effects of the "something" are or if it will actually make the problem better instead of worse. Problems are rarely as simple as one variable.
In January, the British government announced its intention to extend their plastic bag tax to all shops. As of now, only establishments which have more than 250 employees need to impose the charge on single-use plastic bags. In the United States, certain states or cities even go beyond a tax and put an outright ban on them. But the UK government's own research suggests that this is actually bad for the environment.
They definitely aren't the only ones currently having an anti-plastic bag movement. I know that places in Indonesia and the certain U.S. states are as well. It's definitely better to research and find a good solution before just doing anything, but how is banning plastic bags bad for the environment? You didn't really say that part.
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Banning plastic bags itself isn't necessarily bad for the environment but the so-called reusable bags that have replaced them are even worse for the environment. The problem is that these reusable bags don't get enough uses before falling apart to make up for the bigger environmental impact they have.
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Ok, that makes sense. So, while plastic bags aren't good we need a better solution than we currently have.
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Well ... plastic bags are a part of “the seventh continent of plastic” (https://www.livingcircular.veolia.com/en/did-you-know/seventh-continent-plastic)
So yeah, they are bad for the planet!
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So many alternatives currently exist! We don't need plastic bags anymore...
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Perhaps. But the ones most commonly used are even worse than plastic.
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