Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation on Sunday banning the sale at grocery checkouts of all plastic bags, regardless of thickness. The only option for customers who lack their own reusable shopping bags will be buying paper bags for 10 cents each.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/23/us/california-plastic-bags-ban.html
I hear another song coming on.
And last year Sweden abolished their plastic bag tax.
Other features of the budget were tax cuts for pensioners, more money for the justice system, including plans to expand prisons, lowering tax on snus tobacco, raising taxes on cigarettes and abolishing a plastic bag tax.
DB2
“The recession is here. The government and SD [the far-right Sweden Democrats] have chosen to face the economic situation with passivity,” he said.
Criticising the coalition, which depends on the support of the Sweden Democrats, he said: “We have a rightwing government that cooperates with the Sweden Democrats, who say that it is just a matter of cutting back on healthcare and schools and that tough savings are required. Then you let welfare take a large burden of the cost shock that has hit Sweden.”
**That what happens with rightwing governments!**I tried that once. It rained. The bag got wet. My groceries were all over the sidewalk. No more saving the earth at the expense of my groceries.
Does Gavin Newsom go shopping in the rain?
The Captain
What aggravated me about paper bags was some were a lot weaker than others. I remember having a bag once that tore every time I tried to lift it by the rim of the bag. Ended up having to cradle the remains of the bag, and my groceries, in my arms.
Of course, canvas bags are way stronger, have handles, and aren’t weakened by rain.
If people disposed of plastic bags properly, they would not be a problem. But, many people are slobs, so the bags blow around the neighborhood.
Steve
Two things
The 10 cents for paper is a rip off. It is unethical. When you pay for the food you pay for the packaging costs. It is unethical to charge twice for the bags. Thank you grocery industry for putting that in the law, sarcasm.
The other thing, in the produce aisle the green bags are plastic not biodegradable plastic, PLA. The law should have instituted PLA in the produce department.
Wild! One wonders what you did before there were plastic bags available*? Maybe it didn’t rain much in the 1980s? 
*Plastic bags were invented in the 1960s - ironically in Sweden - and were not widely available until the 1980s.
Sorry but no. Venezuela invented the plastic bag.
That is why I am calling for PLA in the produce departments.
PLA is biodegradable. The green bags. But the plastics industry has subbed in recycled plastic and shaded it green. That should be swapped out by legal regulation.
I have contacted legislators on the state and federal level. Action in CT might begin in the new year.
When CT got rid of the cash register plastic bags microplastics was not yet an issue in the public’s mind. It was not studied by the state of CT.
In Portugal [in the EU?] stores are not allowed to give out free bags.
Mercadona supermarket plastic bags are 65-70% recycled plastic.
The windward side of Caribbean islands are dumping grounds for plastics (and beached whales).
The reason to charge for the bag is to reduce the pollution they cause. It’s a disincentive tax.
The Captain
They are not free. They are in the food costs. The law was written by the super markets. It is double charging.
I am talking paper bags. Plastic bags should have been illegal for decades but were not.
That is far worse. That means they become microplastics very quickly. They are not biodegradable. That gets into the entire food chain immediately and stays there for generations.
100% plastic takes much longer to break down.
Seeing plastic on the beaches is better than not seeing microplastic throughout the food chain.
In Venezuela I used to drive to the supermarket. I would take the shopping cart to the car, much less likely to have an accident.
BTW, rain is much more predictable in Venezuela than in Portugal, geography matters.
The Captain
Grocery stores also sell reusable cloth bags for a couple of dollars. Being cheap leads to your problem. I use cloth bags all the time.
Calling people cheap is not nice but par for the Internet.
The Captain
Switching to cloth bags would be the appropriate response.
Being nice would be the appropriate response.
The Captain
Being nice does not keep your paper bag from falling apart in the rain. When it happened to me, I stopped using paper bags on rainy days or when carrying wet produce and frozen foods.
Presumably all meat and fish is wrapped in butcher paper and not just thrown in to the cloth bag?
That is a no brainer!