Wasteful Consumption Taxes

There are certain items that we buy a lot of, that are not luxury, but are not necessary and wasteful.

Bottled Water

By some estimates bottled water is responsible for 0.5% of climate change. This might not sound a lot, but could be the tipping point we fear. And it is quite large when we consider that people are reassessing flying, and those flights equal 1.5% of climate change.

The idea: $1 levy per 500ml on all drink containers that come with non-alcoholic drink within them. Alcohol above 1.5% alcohol is exempt, because it serves a different purpose that can not be readily achieved otherwise. This will encourage people to use their own cups for coffee, and drink tap water instead of bottled. It will also decrease the use of sugar drinks.

Also, any drink that is non-flavoured or carbonated water, cannot be sold. However, bottles, labelled primarily as bottles, and secondarily as the water inside them, is OK.

Plastic Takeaway Containers

Hawaii has banned this, and trend is clear that it will be next after single use plastic bags and plastic straws. Compostable or BYO packaging are the future, so lets get it done now. Patrons in restaurants will not be able to use any single use items. Yep, even napkins will need to be reusable, like the old days. This will encourage people to eat out again instead of the wasteful culture of delivered food.

Clothing

All imported clothing will carry a levy of $10 per item. Underwear, socks and uniforms are exempt.

This will (perhaps) bring back some level of local production. It will definitely reduce imports. And it will reduce the value margin between poor and high quality items.

People will reassess their need to purchase fast fashion, and will be good for the environment in many aspects – manufacture, transportation and end of use waste.

What Else?

Cheap toys are an obvious target in terms of wastefulness, but at this stage it would be unacceptable by society, it would be seen as an attack on children’s play. However, parents of today know that some toys are dirt cheap these days, and our children would be just as happy with fewer, quality toys. Super cheap plastic toys are often a health risk as well.

Packaging is complicated, but lots of packaging is related to display and not protecting products. For example, a plastic toy doesn’t need clamshell packaging. Signage can extoll the virtues of the product.