There’s been a strange thing going on lately in Travis County, TX. It’s not a financial crisis, a political crisis or even an economic crisis. However, our county officials think it is an environmental crisis. Now I’m not sure if it is being done in any other county in the country, but it is happening in my county and I’m really annoyed as should other people. I don’t know if it has something to do with Agenda 21 or just another way for the corporations and government to suck more money out of us taxpayers. What I do know is that in our broke economy, Americans like myself, are trying save every penny we can and this seems to me to be just another small but annoying excuse for the government to drain more money out of people’s pockets.
So what is Travis County’s bright idea or trial idea that they hope will make waves with other counties? It’s basically the same thing China and other Communist countries have been doing for years now, and thanks to our Communist government, it is slowly creeping up in our country as well. It’s called charging people for bags when they shop for groceries, clothes, or just about anything in general. Kinda like that Internet sales tax.
Our county officials, however, see it as a way of helping to save and protect the environment by getting the people to think that plastic bags, which you cannot recycle, are bad and should be outlawed.
Now, I’m may be ok with that logic, shouldn’t I be given a choice? Isn’t that my right as an American? Remember the old saying, “Paper or plastic” when grocery shopping back in the day? Remember when we had a choice? I do. So why can’t we now?
That’s an easy answer. The government and corporations need to suck more money out of the taxpayers. How do they do that? By charging you for paper bags or bags with the corporate logos on them. They take an environmental problem and use it at as a means to make an extra profit off of it by saying, plastic bags are non-recyclable and bad, while paper bags are recyclable and good, but they should still be paid for by the taxpayer and not by the business.
After all, it’s all the taxpayers fault that our environment is bad. The corporations and government are the good guys trying to teach us how to be “proper and responsible citizens” because we don’t know how take care of ourselves. If you believe that, then I got two free tickets to Obama’s next college speech.
Now many of you will say, “Well, SAM’s club, BJ’s, Aldis and wholesale clubs have been doing this for years now. So who cares.” While you may be right, that’s different. That is wholesale, whereas this is retail. Retail companies are supposed to factor that into their inventory and budget. If they can’t, then that’s their problem, NOT the taxpayers. The banks and Wall Street started this trend of making the taxpayers pay for their bad business decisions and now retail companies, corporations and our government are quickly following the bad example.
This has been going on for a month or so now as a trial in Travis County without so much as a debate. Many people either bring their own bags or don’t bring any at all. I personally refuse to pay an extra 10 or 20 cents per bag when I never had to do that before.
As a matter of fact, I’m still confused as to why they are really doing this at all. So I took it upon myself to go to Petco and even the H.E.B. grocery store to ask a couple of young college clerks in order to find an answer to my question.
Starting with Petco, I ask the clerk, “So how come nobody is using bags anymore? Is it a Travis county thing or what?”
So the clerk says, “Yea, it’s kind of a Travis County thing.”
So I said, “So how come they are doing this now all of a sudden?”
So the clerk not sure how to answer, slightly shifts his response and says, “Well, the businesses are losing a lot of money on bags. H.E.B. especially has been losing a lot of money.”
So I said, “Really? But isn’t that what our tax dollars go to? To pay for the bags. How come we have to pay for them now when we never had to before?”
So he then changes his answer yet again and says, “Well, it’s kinda good because there are a lot of plastic bags floating around in the waters and flying around in the streets and it teaches people how to recycle.”
(Sigh!) The dumbing down of America. I just looked at him thinking now that was just the biggest MSM propaganda bullshit response I’ve ever heard. Keep watching the MSM and keep paying for those high quality, college indoctrination fees, you fool. But instead of laughing at him for his naïve little mind, I decided to challenge him further and said, “Ok, but we have always recycled and it has been fine, so why do we have to do this now all of a sudden and be charged or penalized for it?”
By this point, the clerk was hurrying me up to ring me out because he was running out of excuses and was like a robot ready to crash and say, “Does not compute! Does not compute! AHHH!!!!”. He could not give me a response, so I left it at that.
So I go to H.E.B. immediately after that and noticed people getting upset and annoyed about it at the register. So when the young college looking clerk started to ring me out, he asked, “Did you want to purchase a bag today?” I said, “No thanks. I’m boycotting.” He gave me a weird look and then said nothing.
Needless to say, I’m thinking these must have been the same kind of unintelligent students that Obama was preaching to the other day during his speech at Ohio University. I understand that most of the clerks play the “I’m just doing my job” card, but I can tell others were very uncomfortable and not too happy with asking people whether or not they want to purchase a paper bag.
So as you can see, our government and the corporations not only suck money out of us by charging the air we breathe and the water we drink, but now they are charging us for bags to put our food in at the grocery store or bags to put our clothes in at the clothing stores. What used to be free is no longer free. The corporations and government are not making their quotas, so we the customer and taxpayers have to pay for it like everything else. Just like we the taxpayers have to pay for illegal immigrants getting food stamps and our social security and for the illegal wars, Zionist Israel and for bailing out Wall Street and the central bankers. EVERYTHING must be paid for by we the taxpayers. EVERY SINGLE penny!!!
This is sick. We have truly entered another low point in history if people are just going to continue to go along with this without an argument. There was never any vote on it, there was never any debate. Like everything else, it was a decision made by just one stupid little Communist County official, who woke up one morning and said, “Hey, let’s try and suck more money out of the already struggling U.S. taxpayers by charging them for bags. They have a choice to either take it or leave it.”
So the next time you go to a store, you may be surprised to find out that when you get to the counter, instead of hearing, “Paper or plastic”, you will be hearing the clerk say, “Paper for 20 cents or you can carry your own groceries home.”
Welcome to Third World America.
NC
In the name of saving our environment, we have had a 5-cent per bag tax in our county since January 1, 2012. This applies across the board to all retailers: grocery, restaurant carry out, big box, drug stores, specialty stores, clothing stores, you name it. The social and, now, financial pressure is on to be “green” and “sustainable” and reduce our carbon footprints. After one year of this, there is a push by the retailers to modify the tax to apply only to drug, grocery, big box types of stores, and not clothing stores, for example. It is quite honestly hard to lug all those bags around with you to shop, and remember to bring the right number with you. On the other hand, I do as little shopping as I can get away with…
We also have stores here that give a 20-cent credit if you did the right thing by walking or riding a bicycle or took public transportation, rather than drive your car.
I’m offended and frustrated by the obvious manipulation attempts. My answer is to sometimes bring a bag (if I feel like it) and sometimes not (and carry without the bag or pay the tax) and, more frequently, I just try not to buy anything at all.
What’s the problem? Just fill a cart with groceries, dump ’em all on the counter, and when they try to charge you a nickel for the bags just say “sorry. I don’t want to pay for that”, and walk out the door.
It’ll cost them a lot more than a nickel to re-stock all the merchandise, and maybe they’ll get the message.
On the other hand, you can keep paying the nickel, and next week it’ll be a dime.
Love it JollyRoger!
When I do grocery shop it is usually for a month or so.
If they want to restock everything I was going to purchase for a few of bucks, so be it hehehe!
i know they do it in san fran (who’da thunk). it’s a law there, not the fault of the store. however, they should tell you up front with a sign on the door when you come in. so, leaving your stuff and walking out should be for them not telling you up front, not because the law requires them to charge you for a bag.
LOL! @”san fran, who’da thunk”.
They haven’t tried it yet where I live.
Sign or no sign, I’m not going to pay for their freakin’ bag(s) & I’m not going to pay 5cents for a freaking straw or napkin if I go out to eat somewhere (Which can’t be much further down the road……..).
Does anyone remember back in the day, when we ONLY had paper bags, everyone complained of all the trees being cut down/used for the manufacture of paper bags. so the environ-MENTAL-lists pushed for plastic bags in order to save the trees. seriously this is true, does anyone else remember?………it truly seems they have a book of scams to pull off and they rotate these scams out every 30-40 yrs. long enough to where the upcoming generation doesnt know about it, and long enough for the elders to not give a shit about it any further. i talk with my dad and other elders, and they could care less about what is going on in the world, just “gimme my pension check” is all they are concerned about. true apathy. i hope i never turn out that way……….btw would you like paper or plastic?
I remember that Milidude. Now we’re being pushed back to brown paper bags.
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How about Hemp bags? 🙂
I thought all (At least most) of the plastic bags in stores were made from recycled plastic and/or waste? What will they do with all that unused stuff then?
What a great idea for a small business RT 🙂 – hemp paper bags. They would be durable, and evviromentaly freindly, and heck who wouldn`t love to work at a hemp bag factory.
You were reading my mind Digger hehehe!
I was thinking about the phrases that could be printed on them too 😉
Could even have a line with charms or little chimes on them called “The Digger Line Bag” hehe!
they will be illegal in some states. yep, doesn’t even have to be from the thc filled kind. in some states, any and all hemp is illegal: clothes, oil, etc
In my county here in CA they have done away with plastic grocery bags altogether. We have to bring our own shopping bag everywhere we shop, OR if we forgot our bag and they have to issue a paper bag, they charge 10 cents per bag. That applies to all stores as well.
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Yes, I live in a county like that in California also. It is ridiculous and irritating to have to bring my own bags. If I don’t have enough for all my groceries, I won’t buy a bag either. I just tell the clerk to put the groceries in my cart unbagged.
I agree Anne … it is very irritating. Not to mention the area, where the food is bagged into your clean bag, is riddled with e-coli from other people’s bags that aren’t kept clean.
And don’t get me started talking about those yucky grocery carts that aren’t steam cleaned daily. What ever happened to the health department anyway? Ewwwww ….
I sometimes bring a card board box or milk crate with me and place it into the bottom of the grocery cart.
By the way I’m in SLO county.
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I keep 3 thick cardboard boxes in my vehicle perfect for my monthly grocery shopping, recently one of the new children working my choice in store decided he’d call over a manager when he asked me the infamous “paper or plastic” and I pointed to my boxes on the cart under-rack and said he could just put things back in the cart, I’ll sort them at my car thank you (I’ve been doing this at this store for years).
It turns out that this chain of stores has begun training employees to refuse self brought storage and push bags on people because they now add them to your bill as a “value” charge if you “accept” any of their future garbage. This isn’t even a government enforced thing, just a company turning greedy.
I stopped the manager before he could start and told them I won’t be shopping there any further, and be doing my best to warn my community and to support any of their competitors who support freedom of choice.
Being firm to these money gluttons and cutting off their supply is the only language they understand.
gonna have to let us know the name of the company if you plan to “be doing my best to warn my community”
Here in Oregon more and more cities are getting rid of plastic bags. We must bring our own or pay a nickel. Everyone in my town(corvallis) that I have spoken to dis-like it. The city manager just up and decided to do this. I dont pay for them. I just put everything back in the cart and fill my truck. I never use to get produce bags(except for lots of little stuff). My apples where free and my mangos where free. Free to play and mingle with the squash and tomatoes. Now I get a bagh for every item seperate. After I get to my car I fill a produce bag with as much as will fit and take the remaining bags and put small stuff in them. I liked paper bags since I was a kid(33) and used plastic bags for garbage bags in my truck, rv, bathroom, and for litter I find on trails. Now I look at the litter and say “oh well” and my bathroom garbage can gets emptied and washed for the liner is gone. Fascist over lord government I dont pay taxes to be treated like this. Oh wait. I havnt payed taxes in 10 years and will die of officer assisted suicide before funding this crap hole of a govern-ence. If you dont like it dont fund it i always say.
knock knock
Irs is at my door. gotta go dance.
In the 70’s the old man was stationed in Spain . For local shopping off post , he made 5 bags out of para cord for mom.
What is your problem , simpletons ? Mom used those bags for shopping for over 30 years . Look it up line , get some para cord and make some shopping bags , instead of whining like you dropped your lolly in some dog shiite.
Has anyone told you lately?
This is a city that convinced people to “back in” a parking space,down town. Hoping someone behind you has room to back up while you manuever trying to park is no fun and ties up traffic. I dont shop down town any longer.
So when they out lawed plastic bags(mine were never wasted) I rarely shop. “Boy!! what good ideas,cant wait for the next bright idea.
I’m just annoyed by this. I have lived in Buffalo, NY all my life and never had this happen. I come back from China almost a year and a half ago after being out of America for 5 years and I find that suddenly we are becoming China with the bag thing and everything else they charge and try to scam out of us that we didn’t have to pay for years ago. It truly irritates me and pisses me off, whether you like being green or not. Freedom means having the power to choose what you want to do and do not want to do and not to have it forced upon you. That’s my point of this article. They start doing this, then they will find a way to slowly do other things for the sake of some stupid cause that is pushed upon all of us.
Northern NJ here. It’s been going on for awhile and it’s more back-door. If you use your own [re-usable] bags then they take off 2-3 cent per bag from the total.
This is a City of Austin rule. Since it was launched earlier this year, I started shopping outside the Austin city limit in Travis county where bags are used freely. Personally, I understand why overuse of bags is problematic but I can’t stand the local city hall dictating awareness buy decree.
That’s exactly what my wife and I are trying to do. But once again, why should I have to go out of my way or be pushed away to go to some place that offers bags for free when there’s no reason why Austin shouldn’t do the same. It’s absurd.
Ten cents a bag at one local market, but another (same county) is still using plastic. The money just goes to the market — no environmental kitty.
They blame the Pacific garbage patch, but it turns out the patch doesn’t really exist. They blame that the bags don’t break down in landfill, but nothing breaks down the way they landfill now. They blame sea turtle deaths but where are all the bagged turtles washing up on the beaches?
Transportation costs of paper is about 7x plastic.
Thank you! Another person who can see that the government’s excuses are worthless because there’s no justification other than to further suck money out of us and give them more dictatorial social control of how we live our lives.
Frequent aldi shopper and costco member so I’m immune from the bag tax but I feel your pain.
So, you can not recycle plastic bags? Since when? I use mine for garbage, and all kinds of crafts projects, and my cat loves playing with them, am I doing something wrong?