Most of the time when you go shop­ping in the USA, the per­son behind the counter auto­mat­i­cally puts your pur­chased items in a plas­tic bag. That’s a bad default. Instead, they should pro­vide a bag only if you ask. I’d go so far as to say they should charge you for that bag. Then many would begin bring­ing their own bags.

In 2007, San Fran­cisco was the first Amer­i­can city to ban the use of plas­tic bags. 775,000 gal­lons of oil were used to make the plas­tic bags San Fran­cisco used the year before. (Info from SFGate.com.) Think of what a pos­i­tive impact their leg­is­la­tion has had!

In many parts of Europe, that has been law for an even longer time. And in some Euro­pean stores, you can­not get any­thing to put your shop­ping in. (That can catch an out­sider by surprise.)

The only good thing to be said for plas­tic bags is that they keep plas­tic bag man­u­fac­tur­ers in busi­ness. And pro­vide jobs. How­ever, that’s the same logic as say­ing it’s good to keep mak­ing high-alcohol sug­ary pop drinks that appeal to teenagers — because those com­pa­nies employ many people.

Occa­sion­ally I do get a bag, when I for­get to bring one with me. I’m not try­ing to be legal­is­tic — but I am hop­ing that if you buy and use reusable bags, you will enjoy the pos­i­tive impact you’ll be making.

I give my brother credit for the idea for this post. Thanks Bill!