I hate recycling

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

By Judd Grossman

Jackson Hole, Wyoming - Recycling: hauling all that crap down to the bins by the elementary school, trying to find the right bin and tediously tossing in one sticky glass jar at a time while quickly plugging my ears to avoid the painful sound of crashing glass. My fellow recyclers, mostly women, pull up in their old Subarus or late model Volvos, lifting their rear hatches (adorned with stickers that say “hope” and “change”) to reveal tidy petite baskets of recyclables which they proceed to deftly distribute among the appropriate bins, either giving me the polite, knowing smile of the fellow traveler, or avoiding eye contact altogether which is more commonly the case between me and most females between the ages of 8 and 80.

As I make my third trip to the newspaper bin, because I just found another copy of Planet JH under my seat, I fume, and I ponder the inefficiency of it all.  Why am I wasting my time doing this? I could be curing cancer or something.  Well maybe not curing cancer, but perhaps doing something useful like figuring out a way to make some money to feed my family, or maybe finding a way to employ someone.
I’m not just being contrary here (though I’m not above contrariness). I’m trying to get at a fundamental point about efficiency and rationality. I love the concept of recycling - reducing waste, getting more use out of each little bit of material - but I’m never quite sure if the benefits are worth the time invested and the loss of productivity that entails. It all comes down to this: You’ve got to prioritize.
On a national level we’re faced with the same equation: Security, Economy, Environment – in that order. If we don’t have physical security we can’t get anything done. Our economy can’t function in a world where large buildings in New York are blown up every few months, so, job one is to take the necessary actions to make sure that doesn’t happen.

Once we have security, we can get down to having an economy, which I’ll define as the business of taking care of ourselves and working to improve our lot in life. I put economy before the environment, because when people don’t have physical and financial security they don’t have time to worry about the environment.
There are arguments to be made that the environment is pivotal for physical and financial security. It’s obvious that when poisonous gas is being spewed out of a chemical plant in Bhopal the environment quickly becomes the number one priority for the neighbors of that plant, but, in general, environmental issues such as concerns about the future effects of global warming are going to be trumped by the need to put food on the table tonight.

Unfortunately, the environmental movement has gotten mucked up with a mishmash of socialist and Luddite ideologies that refuse to recognize the fact that not only is a well functioning free market economy a higher priority than long term environmental concerns, it’s also the key to solving long term challenges. A vibrant economy that allows a broad swath of humanity a higher standard of living gives individuals and governments the resources to invest in less urgent environmental initiatives. Inefficient tokenism, as most greenhouse gas reduction and recycling efforts prove to be, only hamper our ability to find the solutions that we need.

Locally, the Town of Jackson has a raft of environmental initiatives. Some are useful measures that save the taxpayers money. Some, like the $45,000 per year premium we pay to Lower Valley Energy in order to buy green power from the Strawberry Creek Reservoir, are an inefficient use of taxpayer funds. That money should be returned to the taxpayers, so it can circulate in the local economy.

By the way, if you catch me tossing an empty Coke bottle in the trash, don’t distract me, I’m probably concentrating on a cure for cancer. PJH


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I hate recycling | Planet JH News Article: Right Wing Local

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