If you live in Washington, you know the drill: After bagging your groceries, the checkout machine asks you how many bags you used. And if you used plastic or disposable bags (rather than bags you brought on your own), you have to pay 5 cents per bag. The District passed a law requiring as much in 2009 — a policy that states like New Jersey and New York are also considering, and that has been adopted around the world from Ireland and Scotland to South Africa.
Some localities have gone farther still — California and Hawaii have effectively banned plastic bags outright — but recent research suggests that charges or fees can also be effective (and have the added benefit of being less coercive). Moreover, it suggests that they work, at least in part, through a surprising mechanism. It’s not just the relatively minor added cost, on its own, that impels people to stop using plastic bags and to instead bring their own bags with them to the store. Rather, it’s the way this small change disrupts habitual behaviors and helps people draw a tighter linkage between the environmental awareness that they already possess, and actions in the world that actually advance that consciousness and their values.
Such is the upshot of a new study on plastic bag charges published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology by a team of Argentinian researchers, led by psychologist Adriana Jakovcevic of Buenos Aires University. Charging a relatively small amount for bags “produces changes in behavior,” says Jakovcevic, “and these changes are not only because of the economic value of the incentive — there are also some other processes at play that involve environmental concerns.”
Go read the whole thing. A new ordinance in Buenos Aires in 2012 allowed for a good natural experiment on this since only part of the metro area was subjected to a bag fee. Every time I bring the subject up here I get pushback from groups like the Texas Campaign for the Environment, who support full-on bans and argue that bag fees are not effective. I have always thought that the bag fee idea has merit and what’s more would be politically easier to accomplish. There’s already been an attempt to curtail municipal bag bans by the Legislature, and the issue is sure to come up again in this session. Maybe this is the more practical way to move forward. Read about the Buenos Aires experience and see what you think.
Fees are a valid way to go and may do more to change people’s thinking and habits. OTOH, the bag ban in Austin really has been no big deal for consumers and achieved its stated goals.
Oahu’s ban hasn’t gone into effect yet. I read that quotation and thought “Huh? I just got two plastic bags today!” July 1, 2015 is the target date for our most populated county. Maui banned ’em in 2008, Kauai followed in 2009, and the Big Island did in 2013.