California Statewide Ban on Plastic Bags May Get Binned

A terrible state law in
California appears to be failing and we may have … unions … to
thank. Hey, we’re libertarians. We take allies wherever we can get
them.

Yesterday a proposed statewide ban on single-use plastic bags
(grocery stores and the like) failed to get enough votes in the
state’s Assembly. As the
Sacramento Bee reports, banners lost support because
of their proposed alternative—paper bags for 10 cents each. That
money would go to the grocery stores’ revenue. So liberty may
benefit from a union’s instinctive opposition to anything that
causes their employers to earn more of a profit:

A key organized labor group removed its support and went
neutral, which helped plastic and paper industries opposed to the
bill. In a key late change, the United Food and Commercial Workers
Union – grocery store workers – aligned with skeptics denouncing a
minimum 10-cent fee stores could charge at checkout counters for
paper or reusable bags. …

“This legislation creates a heavy financial burden on consumers
and forces consumers to essentially decide how they would like to
be taxed,” said Assemblyman Dan Logue, R-Marysville. “They can
either purchase a reusable bag to take to the store with them or
they can spend 10 cents for every recycled bag they get at the
store.”

Republicans were not alone in voicing those reservations.
Multiple Democrats rose to say the fee would burden consumers, and
several voted no or abstained.

“To charge for a bag that’s been given free as a part of doing
business, I don’t think is the way to go,” said Assemblywoman
Cheryl Brown, D-San Bernardino.

Disappontingly, the Bee simply allows supporters of the
legislation to assert that the ban helps the environment without
providing any actual evidence. In June, the Reason Foundation
explored many of the claims that plastic bags were a significant
source of litter and that plastic bag bans actually accomplish
anything other than burdening the poor even further and found the
claims wanting. Read more
of their research here.

The bill is not formally dead yet. They have until the end of
the week to try to get it passed.

Those of us in Los Angeles (and many other California
municipalities) are still hosed, though, as our local bans remain
intact. Here’s Reason TV and Kennedy on the crafting of the Los
Angeles ban: