NJ bag ban a failure, California ditching theirs (Opinion)

It's been a couple of years since New Jersey banned single-use plastic bags AND even paper bags at most stores like supermarkets.

So now most of us have "reusable" plastic bags all over our cars and houses. Some people just throw them away, especially if they get their groceries delivered by services like Instacart.

Lawmakers in California have concluded, looking at the data, that since their bag ban was implemented plastic bag waste has increased dramatically since it went into effect," said Sen. Catherine Blakespear, author of a new bill to change their stupid law. 

SEE MORE: Another Jersey diner closes. Is it the end of an era?

Their stupid law was implemented years before our stupid law, so they're way ahead of us on the stupid trail.

As with most stupid public policies, California was one of the first states to do this back in 2016.

Earlier this week both the California Assembly and Senate voted to approve identical bills that would restrict stores from selling "reusable" plastic bags which contain much more plastic than the flimsy ones stores used to give out.

They are proposing to replace those reusable plastic bags with reusable cloth bags (great incubators for bacteria) and also allow stores to offer paper bags made of at least 50% recycled paper for ten cents per bag.

Here in New Jersey supermarkets can't even offer paper bags, but liquor stores and some drug stores like CVS do. Huh? That makes no sense.

Neither does the entire effort and bullshit exercise in virtue signaling and population control that we have gone through for the past two years. A study released earlier this year showed that New Jersey's bag ban law increased plastic use and drove up profits for retailers.

That's great for retailers. God knows they have enough of a hard time trying to make it in our state, but not at the expense of the consumers and as it turns out, the environment to boot.

Most of us have adjusted to the nonsense. But when we cross the river into a state like Pennsylvania and get to walk out of Wawa without stuff in a plastic bag instead of juggling 6 items in our arms until we get to our car, we say WTF!

I guess they don't care about the environment, or their statehouse isn't filled with morons. Maybe the progressive idiots in Trenton who look to California for every brilliant, planet saving, life altering virtue signaling idea can follow their lead again and end this nonsense.

Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Dennis Malloy only.

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