Is this a “sin tax”, an undue restriction on liberties, or an effective way to offset an environmental harm?

Question

or just plain ridicules?

Ireland passed a tax on plastic bags five years ago; customers who want them must now pay 33 cents per bag at the register. Within weeks, plastic bag use dropped 94 percent. Within a year, nearly everyone had bought reusable cloth bags, keeping them in offices and in the backs of cars.

Plastic bags were not outlawed, but carrying them became socially unacceptable — on a par with wearing a fur coat or not cleaning up after one’s dog.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/02/world/europe/02bags.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=science

Answer 1

You are close to the answer. The environmental movement is a industry just like any other kind of business. The only difference is this movement tells you to have guilt by not complying. That's the sin!

Answer 2

Not a bad idea but they shouldn't be called socially unacceptable.  I don't like plastic bags because they end up on beaches and birds get strangled. Not because they "supposedly" help with a "supposed" problem called GW.

But yeah... it isn't as bad as the incandescent bulb bans that are going around. I don't like flourescents because they contain mercury(which if broken. You need to get a hazard team in there to pick it up sometimes depending on how large the bulb was.), they don't have natural light(surprise, surprise..., I guess that's one reason why workers hate the office.), and another reason is because they give me and other people headaches.

Answer 3

Not a sin tax, we need a pollution surcharge. Then put that money back into energy conservation and efficiencies. But even if we cut 2% (like the 2% Solution) over 10 years we would also need to be investing in renewable energy and about that 10th year could cut 20% and get off imported oil. To find out more go to CoolingEarth.org

Answer 4

I pick door number three.

I didn't know about this policy, but I like it.

Answer 5

It seems silly to me. The plastic bags constitute a small fraction of the stuff we discard compared to the boxes and cans and other bags that hold the goods that we carry in these bags. I go to the produce section and put fruits and vegetables in plastic bags, and bread comes in bags and canned food comes in cans and cereal comes in boxes and on and on. The bag you put it all in is just not that large a part of  the solid waste stream.

Answer 6

It seems like an effective way to offset environmental harm to me.  It isn't an undue restriction on liberties because you're still free to have plastic bags -- you're now just forced to pay a premium to account for the hidden costs that have been there all along but that no one really considered before.

FYI - the word is spelled "ridiculous"