Jul 17, 2019
Welcome to Finance & Fury, the ‘Say What Wednesday’ edition. I
recently received a great email from Nick, on a fantastic topic.
So, I’ll read most of the email as background to today’s
discussion;
“Hey Louis, I’ve recently be thinking about an issue that
I think should be at the forefront of people’s minds a lot more
than climate change, and that’s waste pollution.
The issue of waste pollution in both the ocean and land seems to
get a lot less coverage than the issue of climate change, even
though the issue has a far greater capability to affect us in a
dire manner, as pollution can undeniably kill life. Now, what does
this have to do with finance?
I recently attended Groove in the Moo, and they had this system
where they overcharged all cans by $1, but gave you a $1 cash
refund for every can you brought back to the purchasing station. Me
and my friend being thrifty got to work and collected over 200 cans
that we saw just lying on the floor to make some money over the
day. This concept got me thinking though. What if the government
began a program similar to this, whereby if they overcharge
particular items and offer cash refunds for their return to a
recycling centre?
Having a system like this would act as a disincentive for people
wanting to buy single use plastics (as it would then cost more) but
could also effectively stimulate the GIG economy, where a
government doesn’t have to pay for as many workers to clean up
streets and so forth, and also allow people who are short on cash
to earn extra money for recycling and doing the right thing by the
environment (This is of course if people actually took to the idea
of cleaning up rubbish they saw on the street).
I do understand that you get something like $0.05 for every
aluminium can take to a recycling centre, but the incentive isn’t
promoted in any way by the government. Do you think a system like
this could actively help reduce the amount of waste produced,
rather than legislating bans on particular goods (similar to the
ban of single use plastics)? Thanks again for all your content, and
hope to talk soon. Nick”
Awesome Question – and a great way to make some money, nice
work! To start, I think it would be a great thing. I am a big fan
of incentives to recycle and reuse. This program, and different
forms of it, have been in use for a long time.
From what I have seen of this first hand, it does work well when
implemented well;
- I lived in Austria/Germany and while they have few bins, there
isn’t much rubbish around.
- That is due to them having rebates on bottles/other goods that
can be reused. We used to take a carton of bottles back to the
supermarket to get a discount on the next slab
- Even out in parks or concerts, people would walk around and
collect a bottle as soon as it was put down anywhere and come up to
you to ask to take your rubbish away. This was mostly thrifty
people, like Nick, but I noticed it also outside of music events
randomly on the streets – it was the homeless that would go around
and collect bottles – and earn income for themselves.
As mentioned in Nick’s email, some states do have a few cents
reward per can/bottle. It’s not that popular though.
- The issue is a very limited distribution chain – except in
reverse.
- For example; imagine Amazon, what happens if they didn’t have
drones or employed delivery drivers, but relied on delivery people
who come and go at random. Who have to find their own transport, go
grab the item from the storage house and then drop it off to the
person? Good luck getting next day delivery!
- The same problem is in reverse – getting the millions of
recycling items back to the place they are best suited is an issue
especially with the collection method.
- Think about your recycling habits; You may be the best – tear
off labels, rinse out products, remove lids, etc. put it in the
bin, then it gets collected and thrown in with everyone else’s
rubbish, bottles smash, combined with actual rubbish put into the
wrong bin… and it becomes the sum of averages and what basically
becomes rubbish anyway as it can’t be processed or sorted.
- Doing it manually isn’t practical; there’s labour costs –
shipped to Asia – which uses a lot of CO2 in transport
- Due to low environmental regulations overseas, the rubbish was
mostly being burnt or dumped upon arrival anyway.
- The countries that suffer; Indonesia, Vietnam and, in
particular, Malaysia, which received more than 71,000 tonnes of our
plastic in the last year alone – so all that rubbish you see in
pictures of beaches in Bali and Thailand – chance it has come from
our recycling.
- Normally I’d have a bit of a chuckle at government incompetency
and them somehow getting the exact opposite result than intended –
but this situation is really and massively impacts lives – policy
allowed to continue, with opposite to intended effect – wouldn’t
they stop?
- If it was a company – like Amazon and their delivery model, if
the packages are burnt instead how long would they stay in
business?
What can be done?
Give incentives to individuals and also companies to participate
– a free market solution!
- There are two parties here – those producing the goods, and
polluting in the process, and those consuming the goods, and
polluting in the process.
- Recycling policy focuses on us – how to recycle our waste, but
controls the process – a monopoly on supply goods at the government
level. The supply chain is broken, there’s very limited supply due
to everything being sent to Asia
- The policy to put this into force does require the supplies of
goods (i.e. producers and sellers) to willingly adopting the
collection of their rubbish;
- Without an incentive for them to do this, it is hard to enforce
the adoption of this system
- They are instead punished for polluting (but, we will get back
to this topic!)
- The current methods in Australia are state by state. Rubbish
needs to be returned to recycling plants and the homeless don’t
have any method of getting the goods there (as there’s no public
transport close either).
- A lot of the producers aren’t exactly local - supply chains are
normally across many countries
- May be more costly for the producers / large suppliers to
adopt
- To solve this the Government mandates that companies must only
use recycled goods = price rise and undersupply
Where the recycling chain really comes unstuck
unfortunately, is in the process of recycling itself.
- This is a very labour and CO2 heavy industry, so the nature of
trying to reuse goods actually leads to more pollution with the
current methods and technology (like us shipping it overseas to be
done).
- Collection methods are inefficient and costly – is all bundled
and broken up into one pile at great expense to tax payers
- All based on enforcement rather than encouragement
This opens up a very interesting point in economics –
behavioural economics. When people are incentivised and not
punished, they tend to work better, and systems that provide
incentives work better than punishments – in any economy,
environment, etc.
- For example; Two options – one is to make 10 items for your
boss or you get beaten, the other is to make 10 items and you keep
the rest on top to trade – what environment would you have more
items? Items = Food, goods, money
- Worried about pollution? Give companies tax breaks, not fines –
Profits are more effective than fines
- Punishment – there’s a risk you won’t get caught (corruption,
nepotism, government inefficiency)
- Limitations – there may be loop holes or result in opposite to
intended outcomes – forcing one thing but resulting in a worse
outcome
- There’s no instant feedback loop – and it doesn’t stop the
damage – all fines are in the end are an additional government
revenue. Companies continue to pay and the Government continues to
collect (and they’re happy with that arrangement)
- Sometimes the regulations get so green that the companies go
out of business. Then everyone suffers – Government lose the
revenues from the taxes and fines, workers lose incomes (government
loses further tax revenue), consumers lose a good or service, less
competition or options can lead to price increases, and so on.
- Legislating requirements at the individual level isn’t entirely
effective on its own either – littering fines, or having garbage in
your recycling bin – another form of government revenue
- Have the ability to remove the middle-managed system – allowing
consumer and companies trade trash for treasure
- The complexity of modern society is in orders of magnitude
greater than anything humans have experiences based on recorded
history
- In a simple system you can be pretty sure if you do A, then B
will happen – a piece of paper and a drawer
- 1 piece of paper, one drawer – 100% chance of knowing that if
you take paper and store it, will be in that one drawer
- 1 piece – 2 drawers – now there’s a 50/50 chance, 1 piece – 3
draws – now 1/3, so on – this is a simple system. It’s linear.
- However, when you introduce a second step (order of
consequence) the probability jumps when guessing
- 2 pieces – 2 drawers – goes from 50/50 to 25%, 2 pieces – 3
drawers = 9 options from 3
- 5 pieces – 8 drawers – 32,768 outcomes – add one more bit of
paper – 262,144 outcomes
- Complexity in outcomes increases exponentially – paper and
drawers are no comparison to people, companies, governments, and
all of society.
- We live in an incredibly complex system that nobody truly
understands or can predict the effects of actions
So why try? There is a solution to get the best outcomes
(over time). Not a wish list, but one that actually works, unlike
wishes coming true – let’s go back to the example from
Austria
- Austria/Germany – Pick up a case from the supermarket. When
you’re done, take the label off (polite) and return with crate to
supermarket, put it into a mini conveyer belt, hit the pad and it
disappears and you get a docket printout to scan next time you
spend to reduce the bill.
- This is just one example – but it can and is extended to other
goods and items.
Incentives work better than punishments
- Incentives provide growth in new economic activity – like Nick
said, the gig economy and collecting rubbish – Uber Rubbish
- Due to opening up new opportunities – not taking away choices
and freedoms which have the opposite effect
- At the company level – set bonus benchmarks as an incentives
system
- Hit reduction of CO2 targets, use of recycled goods, helping
collect rubbish, etc they may be incentives with tax
reductions
- Way to truly unlock some of the social good that companies can
do – leverage the people as well
- Day off work to go clean up trees – might cost the company $40k
in wages, but save $60k in tax
- Individual incentives
- Money back/money off goods next time you buy – makes you value
garbage
- Help out with cleaning through company programs – get tax
credits, or tax-free bonus from company tax savings
- There are a lot of options – we can work it out based around
how to maximise the system to benefit us
Circular economies (I’ll can do another episode if you guys) – I
was doing CPD points a while back and the study was focusing on
circular economies - an economic system aimed at
minimizing waste and making the most of resources. ... This
regenerative approach is in contrast to the traditional
linear economy, which has a 'take, make, dispose' model of
production.
This sounds good on the surface but this sadly is just more of
the same on a global level promoted by places like the UN.
Governments adopt policy to force the reuse of goods.
If you are interested – let me know –
www.financeandfury.com.au
Thanks Nick! If anyone else has a topic to discuss or a question
to ask, hit me up via our contact page.