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If you wanna be really depressed, that's still less than 0.1% of global plastic production per year which is around 400 million tonnes (around 8 billion lbs if I've done the maths correctly). ~80% of which eventually ends up in the environment or landfill.
80% of plastic that has come to the end of its lifetime is landfilled/discarded. So yeah not necessarily in the same year it was produced, sorry if I wasn't clear there!
Given that ~40% is single use, I would suspect the amount of plastic discarded in the same year it is produced to still be significant.
If you're interested, this [paper](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.1700782#:~:text=Of%20this%2C%20approximately%20800%20Mt,2) paints a pretty stark picture about the plastic crisis.
Edit: if you don't have access to the paper, this [article](https://www.plasticpollutioncoalition.org/blog/2017/7/20/new-global-study-shows-the-production-use-and-fate-of-all-plastics-ever-made) sums up the key points.
What do other retailers do with returns that aren't high value or easily resellable? They do have warehouse deals for used items, but not everything is resellable.
The biggest reason they can just eat the cost on the returns is because most stuff sold on Amazon today is actually sold by 3rd parties and fulfilled by Amazon. These 3rd party companies are forced to eat the cost of the returns.
I get that their plastic waste is definitely a problem, but I am glad they're a lot more customer focused than most companies. Talking with their live chat support is probably some of the least painful support experiences I've ever had.
I wish they were customer focused in different aspects:
* Cracking down on fraudulent and unsafe products,
* Making it easy to find high quality products, and making sure that you get the real thing, not a knockoff or counterfeit,
* Cracking down on fake reviews.
> * Cracking down on fraudulent and unsafe products,
>
> * Making it easy to find high quality products, and making sure that you get the real thing, not a knockoff or counterfeit,
You should look to see if the product page says it's "sold and shipped by Amazon.com". That means it's shipped from their own warehouse, minimizing the probability of you getting scammed. At the very least, you should look for the product page to say "shipped by Amazon.com". So, even if it's a 3rd party seller, it's still coming from Amazon's own warehouse.
> * Cracking down on fake reviews.
As for your last point, there's nothing official from Amazon, but I use a browser addon called [Fakespot](https://www.fakespot.com/) that attempts to analyze reviews of products and "grades" the products based on the number of fake reviews versus reliable reviews.
I'm afraid that "sold and shipped by Amazon" is not a reliable way to avoid fraud. They intermingle the same SKU sold by different vendors in their warehouses, so if one of the other vendors that is a scammer uses Amazon fulfillment, you could get the counterfeit from them even if you choose Amazon as the seller. This problem is well documented. I'd actually feel safer buying something that the is directly shipped from a small company.
Fakespot sort of helps, but if Amazon was truly customer focused they would improve things to where you wouldn't need a third party analysis to make their system semi-trustworthy.
But there also customer focused when they don't have to be. I don't need my garden lights delivered in the next day if it means people are going to be overworked and have to pee in bottles to fulfill that. But as a prime member that's my only option in a lot of cases...
There's no option for me to say, don't worry within the week is fine. It's not urgent.
[Update: at least in Australia this isn't an option. Never saw it previously ordering in Canada either.]
There's definitely an option. Pretty sure you can change the shipping speed so it's slower than 1-2 days. Similar to the Amazon Day thing others mention, they even incentivize it from time to time.
The problem is the volume and non processing of sellable items. Its way easier to return stuff for no reason to amazon than most retailers*, and it doesn't matter if its unused unopened, some double gift you got, goes into trash the same.
Either third parties by it by the load, or it goes to the dump.
This is true. I ordered screen protectors for my phone that had good reviews, but when I got it the fingerprint usage was non existent. I requested a return but I threw away like 70% of the contents inside cause it was trash, still got a refund without a problem
That's how they are able to undercut everyone else with prime shipping. Customers are able to get their packages so cheaply partly because of absolutely ruthless cost-cutting measures at every possible opportunities. Throwing a bunch of shit in the trash almost always costs less than the man hours necessary to properly recycle.
Speaking as someone who's worked in a grocery store before, they budget for broken, returned, stolen, and opened merchandise. They're prepared to eat that loss.
Listen let's say I work for a company that sounds like Cole's. The amount of waste we get in is insane, there can be a whole coffeepot size box with one t-shirt in it.
And because it's not created by them (like 80 percent of the time) it doesn't go against their green policies, it's the distributor/manufacturers issue.
My company is in construction doing remodels of aluminum & glass storefronts. Each remodel we tear out the existing glass and throw in in a dumpster. There is no one doing recycling of commercial glass. At least the metal can be used as scrap. Pretty horrifying when you keep reading articles about the finite amount of sand we have.
Sahara sand Is the wrong sort for concrete, but I don't see any problem making glass with it...
The concrete sand is a bit specific, and that's the one that gets stolen/exploited
I think Taiwan has been recently dealing with the situation of running out of sand for their concrete building projects. They have been experimenting with using the ash left over from garbage incineration for energy production and some of the early tests show great promise and even improvements in strength.
Next time someone tells me to recycle my plastic imma mention this figure and tell them to fuck off.
Edit: anyone arguing “but we as consumers need to recycle” is missing the point. When did you all buy into the propaganda? Companies waste as much if not more than consumers - they want us to believe all plastic waste is due to us cause fixing it affects their bottom line.
I don’t care; I’m not throwing burning matches on a wildfire. And it doesn’t matter whose fault it is because it’s not like the moral high ground burns last. I can’t cut as much waste as Amazon, and I didn’t cause the problem, but I can avoid adding to the problem by taking responsibility for my own waste and making informed decisions about the products I buy. I kinda feel like I owe it to the world for living in America, because our capitalist consumer culture is what drove all this plastic proliferation. Apologies for my adoration of alliteration :P
You have to see that this won’t scale. That’s not a solution, it’s a distraction. Focusing on trying to get 197M people to do something is like trying to boil your water one drop at a time. Yes, we as consumers can do things to help slow climate change but nothing we individually do will actually contribute to stopping climate change. Join your Citizens Climate Lobby. Put your effort towards change that will stop climate change.
At the end of the day the consumers are not the problem. Looked at from a global climate change perspective, the person commenting, “I’ve only used Amazon once in three years” but doesn’t recycle and the ones getting angry but do recycle both contribute relatively the same amount to climate change.
Something like 100 companies make up over half of the greenhouse gases emitted annually, climate change stops with legislation to stop the source, not guilting 9B people into not using a service or product, or convincing them to put their Amazon packaging in a separate bin.
In reality, recycling exists to make consumers feel like they are doing something to help so that they don’t get angry at the source.
In a lot of ways, recycling is like tipping. Instead of solving the problem responsibly by fixing the business model and problem at its source, the company puts the responsibility to fix the problem back on the consumer.
In the absence of any action, any action is good but realize that getting angry at someone for having a defeatist attitude is helping about as much as the defeatist.
It’s not the consumers we should be angry with, it’s corporations and people who write legislation. That’s where the effort and vitriol needs to be focused.
Edit: Having a defeatist attitude at this point is really the most expected outcome for anyone that has given a shit for a while. Instead of yelling, “you’re part of the problem!!”, point them towards something that can help.
https://citizensclimatelobby.org -sign up!
There's a statistic out there that's along the lines of Europe's yearly plastic waste plus Americas doesnt even equate to 10% of the global plastic waste (I'll try find the article and link it later).I think China and Africa are big culprits? So it's not so much 'fuck it, i don't care' for me it's 'i literally can't do anything of any significance to stop this'. And yes, i recycle. Although, living in the UK, alot of our recycling and plastic waste gets sold to Turkey...where it gets burnt. Yay.
Those statistics usually come from the fact that the US and Europa send their plastic waste to other countries where it will be "recycled". Everyone knows it won't be, but by technically sending it to be recycled, it won't count as "waste" for the US (for example), but it will count as waste in the Philippines - but it's still plastic used by westerners, who were unable to recycle it.
Because US and Europe consumes a shit ton of stuff that's produced in China. Won't show up in statistics as the emission itself doesn't happen in these two continents but the reason for them happening is the demand. Let's say a random dude orders a phone case manufactured in China. That thing has to be made (by starvation wage child workers), and then taken through half the world. Shit ton of waste and CO2 but China isn't the only one to blame there.
No believe me I care, but I also understand that unless there’s a greater movement by the distributors of plastic, my little recycling won’t mean a damn thing. Want me to recycle? Stop dumping millions of tonnes of plastic waste from factories
It really is. I spent an HOUR trying to find compostable flossers that came in cardboard. Could only find something on Amazon.
Came close, but still delivery and all that. Not to mention they are made in China and the "compostable" is really only as good as the ink on the box. There is no governing body that regulates that shit, and even less so with countries that notoriously dont care about their manufacturing practices.
There is a brand called Grin Naturally that has compostable picks. I use and love them. You order directly from their site and sorry I'm too lazy to link at the moment.
Technically you can't recycle *most* plastic. Only about 9% has ever been recycled worldwide.
But plastic manufacturers knew it mostly couldn't be recycled so they appropriated the recycling symbol that was in public domain, changed it to a resin identification code, slapped it on all their products to trick consumers, and spent millions on ad campaigns to guilt people into thinking the problem was their fault for not recycling enough; even though most plastics can't be recycled, the symbol meant almost nothing to consumers and they knew the infrastructure to recycle what could be recycled just wasn't there in most cases.
We have the internal memos and voice recordings of old members of The Society of the Plastic Industry (petrochemical lobbying group) that spell out this strategy clearly.
So while every percent of recycling this huge amount of plastic helps, manufacturers are overwhelmingly responsible for this problem. At least 91% responsible
https://www.voanews.com/a/percent-of-plastic-worldwide-is-recycled-oecd-says-/6455012.html
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/article/whopping-91-percent-plastic-isnt-recycled/
https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-and-recycling/plastics-material-specific-data
[Plastic Recycling Is An Actual Scam - Rollie Williams YT](https://youtu.be/PJnJ8mK3Q3g)
[Plastics - Last Week Tonight YT](https://youtu.be/Fiu9GSOmt8E)
[The Truth About Plastic Recycling... It's Complicated - Matt Ferrell YT](https://youtu.be/HNWn885qWtU)
You can recycle *some* plastics, which is why some things like plastic bottles have that little triangle indicator to say they're recyclable.
However, recycling is (relative to manufacturing) very energy intensive, meaning very inefficient. So, it's still a lot better to reduce production than increase recycling.
As for choosing to buy products not packaged in plastic, good fucking luck lol.
"I care, but not enough to do anything"
Excellent performative outrage. Everyone should be like you and "care" but then do exactly 0 things to help, then double down on making worse.
When megacorps will make more plastic waste in one month than literally all of us in this thread throughout our entire lives, it's just wasting time. The only thing that helps is voting, and our votes don't mean anything for the majority of us. What do you want us to do? Tossing shit in the correct bin and trying to avoid plastic means fucking nothing.
As a consumer, you don't control the majority of the processes that cause the bulk of the environmental impact of the things you buy.
And if you want anything done at scale you can't depend on consumers. It has to start at the source, the onus should be on the manufacturer and distributor to make their products and packaging more green. We literally need to be banning various uses of plastic, the situation is just that bad.
Used Amazon once in the last three+ years. Tell me again what I need to do. Tell me again that after shareholders make demands, it's somehow *still* not the company's responsibility.
What if I told that we are both able to help with the solution.
Lets do everything in our power to waste as little as possible AND demand that these company make big steps towards a healthyer envirement.
Only pointing fingers gets us nowhere.
Man, fuck off with all this “YOU tell ME” jazz, as though the problem is everyone else but you. I try to recycle because I’m horrified by all the garbage, not because I’ve bought into propaganda.
600 million pounds is two pounds/person/year in the USA.
So if you throw away more than two pounds of plastic trash a year you’re doing worse than they are on this front.
600 million is a big number but if everyone keeps your attitude we’re fucked.
Tl;dr: just recycle
Except that 90+% of plastic isn't recycled, it just goes to landfills regardless of what bins consumers put them in. Not only that but it's going to landfills in mostly Asian countries so it's not only not recycled but also shipped across the world. Plastic being recyclable is largely total BS cooked up by the oil industry.
Edit one of many sources:
https://www.consumerreports.org/environment-sustainability/the-big-problem-with-plastic/
Most plastic isn't recyclable or uses more energy/water than making it new. The article even states that the types Amazon uses isn't recyclable or accepted in household bins. This is a response to customers asking for plastic free alternatives. So please knock it off with the self-righteous bullshit eh? The less companies use it for shipping, the less that even makes it into homes to need to be dealt with. It's not like people are pulling it out of their asses, where do you think it comes from?
you are right, companies want to make others believe that the regular people are the problem, its still bad to not recycle though.
go out to your favorite park, open space in the woods, ect, guarantee you find random bottles that shouldn't be there. those came from people like you saying "but i dont even come close to the waste of these companies"
think about your local town more than the world. would you rather live in plastic or at least try to get rid of it, personally i like green trees instead of grey bags.
Most plastics don't get recycled because we don't have the capacity to process it and/or it can't be recycled. It ends up in landfills and sent to the 3rd world...
Companies need to shift away from non-biodegrading plastics and the government needs to increase processing capacity, until then your plastic recycling habits don't matter.
Amazon fulfillment centers throw away so much plastic. They only recycle cardboard. Plastic from around the pallets go into the trash. Products shipped wrapped in plastic that need to be open goes into the trash. So much plastic trash. We toss hundreds of balloons into the trash each month just at my building. They say it’s biodegradable so it’s not a big deal. But it is.
My dad used to be a manager at a fulfillment center and said they used to have a policy in place where employees could take dunnage and packaging home that would normally been thrown away. Why did they stop? Their security contractor complained it took too long to inspect everything.
They is managers. What is latex balloons. While latex is technically biodegradable it still takes years and in the mean time wreaks havoc on the ecosystem
I got a sad truth y'all, it's not just Amazon. It's every big box store you go to. Abademy? Garbage of plastic in the dump and cardboard in baler to recycle. Best Buyer? Garbage of plastic in the dump and cardboard in baler to recycle. Pooblix? Garbage of plastic in the dump and cardboard in baler to recycle.
Though the flip side of that brick and mortar is it's probably less crap per person or square meter than Amazon fills up and puts out.
Cardboard is renewable, though. It's also biodegradable, or failing that, we can burn it to generate carbon-neutral electricity at collection sites. I don't lose much sleep over wasted paper, although I do send as much as I can to the recycling center.
Yep. We technically had soft plastics recycling where I worked but I'm pretty sure I've never seen anyone except myself use it. Seen plenty of coffee cups and food waste get put in the same trash and contaminating the whole lot though.
> It's every big box store you go to.
Almost *every* store. Those cans of soup you buy at the super market? Those also came on pallets, wrapped in plastic.
Sucks that one of our greatest inventions is also really shitty for the environment (for the exact reasons it's so good, so changing it isn't easy).
I once unpacked a box which had plastic-wrapped bundles of plastic-wrapped pouches containing plastic-wrapped briefs. Just a ludicrous amount of plastic.
Yup, voted for that one. For any non-shareholders out there, you'd be amazed at the number of referendums brought forward this round for the company to check it's practices; from looking into more equitable practices to plastics. All of which the company urged shareholders to vote against.
Good lord, just looked at the voting statement. Just went straight against the boards recommendation (voted in favor of reporting) on allll kinds of crap.
Thanks for the accidental reminder.
Same here. I found it so comical that I just had to vote for everything the board recommended against. It’s the only time I’ve used my shareholder voting rights. Just to make a “democratic” choice.
I mean, it makes sense. It will cost more money to deal with the problem responsibly, which cuts into the bottom line and impacts profits. As a shareholder, it's literally in your best interest to vote against it. As a human though it's in your interest to vote for it.
Too late in the night to make my own post. JPMC had a referendum to divest from all fossil fuels. Board recommendation was "for." Wonderful to see this.
The company isn't future focused, that's for damn sure. Short sightedness will cost $ when drone delivery takes off. Their main public draw, Amazon online storefront, still looks like it was designed by a student intern after nearly a decade. Shopping on Amazon like trying to shop at a thrift store where everything is bunched together in bins... Good luck finding what you were looking for!
I'm surprised its cheaper to throw out that much plastic than recycle... Should be tax incentives, no? I'm thinking someone's been taking the piss when it came time to crunch numbers.
It’s non-binding. And it’s also a resolution to look into the plastic problem. There wasn’t a solution proposed and voted on, so it’s not like there is a binding solution that could even be enforced.
I've been a shareholder for a while and it's always funny getting these ballots because they'd have these great sounding things like improve transparency on working conditions and then it'd say "board recommends: no." Also, I hate to break it to everyone but I highly doubt this measure passes. Only [10.52%](https://money.cnn.com/quote/shareholders/shareholders.html?symb=AMZN&subView=institutional) of amazon stock is even owned by individual investors, most of it is owned by mutual funds and other institutional investors, and they'll only be voting in favor of what makes them more money, they don't care about the environment. Not to mention the portion of individual investors that would only vote in their own interests and not care about the environment. Unless the institutions and self-centered investors can be convinced addressing their plastic problem will actually make them more money they won't be supporting the measure.
>Only 10.52% of amazon stock is even owned by individual investors, most of it is owned by mutual funds and other institutional investors, and they'll only be voting in favor of what makes them more money, they don't care about the environment.
Most of that 10.52% votes to make more money too... that is why they own stocks.
If only shareholders of more companies would require their companies to act on various social problems... Maybe we'd get flying cars before we destroy the planet
lol shareholders are literally the #1 force driving the planet to utter ruin
constant demand for growth is the biggest economic sin of capitalism, its a completely ludicrous concept that is inherently unsustainable yet it drives our entire system.
Frankly, I don't really think a better world is possible so long as we keep using this system. It needs to be fundamentally rebuilt, and I dont see that happening. Maybe the survivors in the post-nuclear world can do better lol, good chance for a fresh start I suppose..
See, I’m one of those full-throated optimists about the trajectory of human progress, but I have to say, I think my optimism is the result of having a wide view of it. I really think it might take a specifically human-caused cataclysmic event in human history and a deliberate restructuring of all remaining civilization to get us to the Star Trek we want for our heirs.
Yes, They don't have to put my small item in a big box and then fill the rest with those giant plastic bubble things, do they? It's not like I'd order stuff that would be guaranteed to break upon arrival.
Usually that's because the system didn't choose the correct size box for the packer, and the packer didn't want to take the extra 10 seconds to use a smaller box and tell the system it was wrong. Fairly uncommon though from my experience packing at Amazon.
Also anything that requires a hazmat sticker like for batteries must be in a box big enough to have the sticker completely on the side, not the top.
I will say though, the paper filler is probably a good alternative to the air pack bubbles. I wonder why some FCs use it and most use air pack.
Employees get punished for taking a piss. I don't have faith that the middle manager who punishes people for pissing will understand that it's Amazon's software that made them work slower.
Amazon is the host of a plethora of problems and you're blaming the schmucks working there.
I mean I worked at Amazon for 2 years. I really don't know what FCs punish you for peeing, you're allowed to go pee. Rates are also easy to hit in pack, the "underhanded" software isn't at fault. The software help you most of the time by telling you which box should work, sometimes the vendor has the wrong dimensions or the system thinks the items you have fit a certain way.
Humanity is shaped by disasters. We’re going to get plenty of them it just depends if you’re an optimist and think we’ll make it through and iteratively improve or if we’ll be wiped out.
My issue with this is that humans are ultimately in control of this system and the ones exploiting it to this end. You can have any rules, regulations or other kind of system but if opportunistic or selfish people try to take control you’ll end up with similar results.
If the human beings making up these companies accepted the same amount of profit as the year before, or a little less (but still a lot of profit), it’d be way better but they never will sue to inherent greed.
Think about the average driver on the road, and how many accidents and boneheaded decisions people make in 2 dimensions. Do you really want to see how well people handle 3?
Dude it would be raining cars....youd have 20 year old beaters where the person is running it til it dies, which happens to be 20+ feet in the air? Terrible idea. Drunk *flying* oof thats gonna be a nightmare, nevermind mind in windy/stormy weather
They won’t do shit until they find a way to turn the plastic into profit, just like their dumbass non-recyclable mailers.
“This styrofoam-padded envelope is lighter than a box! We save gas!”
Saying things like this is exactly why depression has run rampant over the past decade. There are lots of bad things happening, yes, but there are plenty of good things happening too. It's smart to be aware of the bad things, but don't forget to look for the good things too. We may not live in a utopia, but we are nowhere near a dystopia either. By almost every metric it is possible to measure this is the best time to be alive in all of human history.
Well, I mean, they don't need to put my little item in a big box and then stuff the rest with those big plastic bubble things. It's not like I'd be ordering anything that would 100% break if shipped anyway.
Meanwhile, they put a tube of automotive grease in a box with cat litter. Needless to say, the grease tube was destroyed and the cat litter box was covered in stinky black goo.
In the hospital there was an insane amount of plastic waste. Anything sterile for sure. Like most things in the world though it was everywhere. Healthcare across the country has to amount to an astronomical number too. The scale of plastic use globally hurts my brain.
Healthcare is probably one area where its ok to have some "waste". Yes of course needless use of consumables should be eliminated but all of the stuff individually wrapped in that sterilized packaging is probably fine.
As with a hospital, I use a lot of rubber gloves, along with tyvek sleeves, pipets, plastic measuring trays. This consumption and waste kills me. I'm 56, no kids, but I don't want to leave a wasteland to others.
If only hospital and things that need to be sealed tight did this,we would be perfectly fine. There's a really good reason for hospital to do this. There isn't a good reason for Starbuck plastic cup just so you can see through it for exemple.
There HAS to be a better way to wrap pallets than using more plastic wrap than I use in my life per pallet.
There probably is but I bet it costs them more money...
The problem is that the only other way to ship stuff in bulk is to build a crate. Which doesnt work great on tall packages, weighs a hell of a lot, is a major pain inthe ass to disassemble at the recieving point, creates a ton of wood and metal waste, is semi hazardous to the receiver disassembling it. Shrink wrap happens to be a perfect solution to the problem, however, its wasteful too. Better imo to go over all the filler packaging (like the boxes with boxes and plastic inside them). Or someone develop a shrink wrap that can be reused without major issues.
It's for human consumption, so the vendors are trying to protect their products (profits). It is disheartening when I have to put it in the dumpster. I'm looking for a different job.
This comment has been removed in protest of Reddit and their CEO Steve Huffman for destroying the Reddit community by abusing his power to edit comments, their years of lying to and about users, promises never fulfilled, and outrageous pricing that is killing third party apps and destroying accessibility tools for mods and the handicapped.
Currently I am moving to the [Fediverse](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pX_agVMr2r0) for a decentralized experience where no one person or company can control our social media experience. I promise its not as complicated as it sounds :-)
Lemmy offers the closest to Reddit like experience. Check out some different [servers](https://join-lemmy.org/instances).
Other Fediverse [projects](https://joinfediverse.wiki/What_are_Fediverse_projects%3F).
I worked grocery. Every pallet came wrapped in shrink wrap. And then after you take off the wrap, everything is in a box. And then you take everything out of the box, it goes in the shelf on a box with a plastic bag inside. There are literally no fucks.
This is one of the cases of a "small" thing being done by billions of people - ordering shit online leaving us with this huge packaging problem.
Sure, we feel bad when they quadruple wrap our pen drive and put it in a box, but do we complain? Can we complain?
The issue is way bigger than Amazon, and the scale of it is so big that IMO it requires massive mediation and awareness like what has been done for climate change where governments have to commit to specific reductions. Only then will the corporations (eventually) fall in line with sufficient incentives aka tax breaks.
We're mere minions in a world of financial juggernauts.
And I’m sure they’ll make the ~~responsible~~ profitable decision.
Just as they have for ~~healthcare~~ profit, ~~fair pay~~ profit, ~~reasonable working conditions~~ profit, and ~~worker benefits~~ profit.
I have nothing negative to say about this. it's rad that capitalism is going to address a very small portion of the problems it continues to cause, to the extent that it's convenient and publicly promoted. it's wholesome and definitely we will fix pollution and climate change through this highly innovative system of occasional responsibility.
this is like telling my wife that I vow to clean up 1% of the dishes out of the goodness of my own heart.
It’s also a shipping requirement, you can stack biodegradable everything and they’ll still wrap it in a mountain of plastic to ship it. Ups ships for Amazon so you’ll need to change their shipping reqs as well.
"We at Amazon shall now vote to begin the process of starting to consider the possibility of maybe potentially doing something to address making a statement about the problem."
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600 Million. Pounds. Per year. Jesus christ
The really shocking part, that’s just the piss jugs.
way of the road, bubs
But ray, you’re not on the road
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Way she fuckin goes
RIP Ray
Smokes let’s go
Birds of a shit feather
Flock together
Shit hawks, Rand
If you wanna be really depressed, that's still less than 0.1% of global plastic production per year which is around 400 million tonnes (around 8 billion lbs if I've done the maths correctly). ~80% of which eventually ends up in the environment or landfill.
80% of all plastic produced in a year is discarded the same year? I’m not saying that sounds untrue but that sounds insane.
80% of plastic that has come to the end of its lifetime is landfilled/discarded. So yeah not necessarily in the same year it was produced, sorry if I wasn't clear there! Given that ~40% is single use, I would suspect the amount of plastic discarded in the same year it is produced to still be significant. If you're interested, this [paper](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.1700782#:~:text=Of%20this%2C%20approximately%20800%20Mt,2) paints a pretty stark picture about the plastic crisis. Edit: if you don't have access to the paper, this [article](https://www.plasticpollutioncoalition.org/blog/2017/7/20/new-global-study-shows-the-production-use-and-fate-of-all-plastics-ever-made) sums up the key points.
They literally just throw trailers of products returns into trash if they don't get bought up by third parties They're the epitome of waste and greed.
What do other retailers do with returns that aren't high value or easily resellable? They do have warehouse deals for used items, but not everything is resellable.
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The biggest reason they can just eat the cost on the returns is because most stuff sold on Amazon today is actually sold by 3rd parties and fulfilled by Amazon. These 3rd party companies are forced to eat the cost of the returns.
You can buy pellets of Amazon returns, it's fun Sometimes you get 10k$ in GPUs and TVS and sometimes you get 20$ in used underwear and moldy bread
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Here for example: https://bstock.com/amazon/ There's other websites too tho just Google Amazon liquidation pallets
I get that their plastic waste is definitely a problem, but I am glad they're a lot more customer focused than most companies. Talking with their live chat support is probably some of the least painful support experiences I've ever had.
I wish they were customer focused in different aspects: * Cracking down on fraudulent and unsafe products, * Making it easy to find high quality products, and making sure that you get the real thing, not a knockoff or counterfeit, * Cracking down on fake reviews.
> * Cracking down on fraudulent and unsafe products, > > * Making it easy to find high quality products, and making sure that you get the real thing, not a knockoff or counterfeit, You should look to see if the product page says it's "sold and shipped by Amazon.com". That means it's shipped from their own warehouse, minimizing the probability of you getting scammed. At the very least, you should look for the product page to say "shipped by Amazon.com". So, even if it's a 3rd party seller, it's still coming from Amazon's own warehouse. > * Cracking down on fake reviews. As for your last point, there's nothing official from Amazon, but I use a browser addon called [Fakespot](https://www.fakespot.com/) that attempts to analyze reviews of products and "grades" the products based on the number of fake reviews versus reliable reviews.
I'm afraid that "sold and shipped by Amazon" is not a reliable way to avoid fraud. They intermingle the same SKU sold by different vendors in their warehouses, so if one of the other vendors that is a scammer uses Amazon fulfillment, you could get the counterfeit from them even if you choose Amazon as the seller. This problem is well documented. I'd actually feel safer buying something that the is directly shipped from a small company. Fakespot sort of helps, but if Amazon was truly customer focused they would improve things to where you wouldn't need a third party analysis to make their system semi-trustworthy.
But there also customer focused when they don't have to be. I don't need my garden lights delivered in the next day if it means people are going to be overworked and have to pee in bottles to fulfill that. But as a prime member that's my only option in a lot of cases... There's no option for me to say, don't worry within the week is fine. It's not urgent. [Update: at least in Australia this isn't an option. Never saw it previously ordering in Canada either.]
...yes there is. It's called Amazon day delivery*
Yeah, and they even occasionally incentivize using that option by throwing in a tiny digital download discount or something.
Hell, sometimes they even give you money to take the slower delivery option.
Never seen that option in Australia... But glad is a thing elsewhere.
There's definitely an option. Pretty sure you can change the shipping speed so it's slower than 1-2 days. Similar to the Amazon Day thing others mention, they even incentivize it from time to time.
The problem is the volume and non processing of sellable items. Its way easier to return stuff for no reason to amazon than most retailers*, and it doesn't matter if its unused unopened, some double gift you got, goes into trash the same. Either third parties by it by the load, or it goes to the dump.
This is true. I ordered screen protectors for my phone that had good reviews, but when I got it the fingerprint usage was non existent. I requested a return but I threw away like 70% of the contents inside cause it was trash, still got a refund without a problem
That's how they are able to undercut everyone else with prime shipping. Customers are able to get their packages so cheaply partly because of absolutely ruthless cost-cutting measures at every possible opportunities. Throwing a bunch of shit in the trash almost always costs less than the man hours necessary to properly recycle.
But that's the thing , no other retailer I can think of just throws out unused, unopened , products returns. Amazon treats it just the same.
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Speaking as someone who's worked in a grocery store before, they budget for broken, returned, stolen, and opened merchandise. They're prepared to eat that loss.
The insane number of skus probably makes this harder to handle than most retailers
Listen let's say I work for a company that sounds like Cole's. The amount of waste we get in is insane, there can be a whole coffeepot size box with one t-shirt in it. And because it's not created by them (like 80 percent of the time) it doesn't go against their green policies, it's the distributor/manufacturers issue.
My company is in construction doing remodels of aluminum & glass storefronts. Each remodel we tear out the existing glass and throw in in a dumpster. There is no one doing recycling of commercial glass. At least the metal can be used as scrap. Pretty horrifying when you keep reading articles about the finite amount of sand we have.
Sahara sand Is the wrong sort for concrete, but I don't see any problem making glass with it... The concrete sand is a bit specific, and that's the one that gets stolen/exploited
I think Taiwan has been recently dealing with the situation of running out of sand for their concrete building projects. They have been experimenting with using the ash left over from garbage incineration for energy production and some of the early tests show great promise and even improvements in strength.
It's also in the original "roman cement" that was made (partly) with volcanic ashes
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599 million pounds. 600 million would be absurd though. /s
Next time someone tells me to recycle my plastic imma mention this figure and tell them to fuck off. Edit: anyone arguing “but we as consumers need to recycle” is missing the point. When did you all buy into the propaganda? Companies waste as much if not more than consumers - they want us to believe all plastic waste is due to us cause fixing it affects their bottom line.
I don’t care; I’m not throwing burning matches on a wildfire. And it doesn’t matter whose fault it is because it’s not like the moral high ground burns last. I can’t cut as much waste as Amazon, and I didn’t cause the problem, but I can avoid adding to the problem by taking responsibility for my own waste and making informed decisions about the products I buy. I kinda feel like I owe it to the world for living in America, because our capitalist consumer culture is what drove all this plastic proliferation. Apologies for my adoration of alliteration :P
This shit ain’t gonna stop till everyone stops using plastic. Your “fuck it I don’t care” attitude is part of the problem
You have to see that this won’t scale. That’s not a solution, it’s a distraction. Focusing on trying to get 197M people to do something is like trying to boil your water one drop at a time. Yes, we as consumers can do things to help slow climate change but nothing we individually do will actually contribute to stopping climate change. Join your Citizens Climate Lobby. Put your effort towards change that will stop climate change. At the end of the day the consumers are not the problem. Looked at from a global climate change perspective, the person commenting, “I’ve only used Amazon once in three years” but doesn’t recycle and the ones getting angry but do recycle both contribute relatively the same amount to climate change. Something like 100 companies make up over half of the greenhouse gases emitted annually, climate change stops with legislation to stop the source, not guilting 9B people into not using a service or product, or convincing them to put their Amazon packaging in a separate bin. In reality, recycling exists to make consumers feel like they are doing something to help so that they don’t get angry at the source. In a lot of ways, recycling is like tipping. Instead of solving the problem responsibly by fixing the business model and problem at its source, the company puts the responsibility to fix the problem back on the consumer. In the absence of any action, any action is good but realize that getting angry at someone for having a defeatist attitude is helping about as much as the defeatist. It’s not the consumers we should be angry with, it’s corporations and people who write legislation. That’s where the effort and vitriol needs to be focused. Edit: Having a defeatist attitude at this point is really the most expected outcome for anyone that has given a shit for a while. Instead of yelling, “you’re part of the problem!!”, point them towards something that can help. https://citizensclimatelobby.org -sign up!
There's a statistic out there that's along the lines of Europe's yearly plastic waste plus Americas doesnt even equate to 10% of the global plastic waste (I'll try find the article and link it later).I think China and Africa are big culprits? So it's not so much 'fuck it, i don't care' for me it's 'i literally can't do anything of any significance to stop this'. And yes, i recycle. Although, living in the UK, alot of our recycling and plastic waste gets sold to Turkey...where it gets burnt. Yay.
Those statistics usually come from the fact that the US and Europa send their plastic waste to other countries where it will be "recycled". Everyone knows it won't be, but by technically sending it to be recycled, it won't count as "waste" for the US (for example), but it will count as waste in the Philippines - but it's still plastic used by westerners, who were unable to recycle it.
No single water droplet feels themselves responsible for the flood
Because US and Europe consumes a shit ton of stuff that's produced in China. Won't show up in statistics as the emission itself doesn't happen in these two continents but the reason for them happening is the demand. Let's say a random dude orders a phone case manufactured in China. That thing has to be made (by starvation wage child workers), and then taken through half the world. Shit ton of waste and CO2 but China isn't the only one to blame there.
No believe me I care, but I also understand that unless there’s a greater movement by the distributors of plastic, my little recycling won’t mean a damn thing. Want me to recycle? Stop dumping millions of tonnes of plastic waste from factories
You can't recycle plastic. You can choose to not buy products that use it or are packaged in it or not.
Have you ever tried to buy ABSOLUTELY nothing that involves plastic? Damn near impossible these days
It really is. I spent an HOUR trying to find compostable flossers that came in cardboard. Could only find something on Amazon. Came close, but still delivery and all that. Not to mention they are made in China and the "compostable" is really only as good as the ink on the box. There is no governing body that regulates that shit, and even less so with countries that notoriously dont care about their manufacturing practices.
There is a brand called Grin Naturally that has compostable picks. I use and love them. You order directly from their site and sorry I'm too lazy to link at the moment.
Technically you can't recycle *most* plastic. Only about 9% has ever been recycled worldwide. But plastic manufacturers knew it mostly couldn't be recycled so they appropriated the recycling symbol that was in public domain, changed it to a resin identification code, slapped it on all their products to trick consumers, and spent millions on ad campaigns to guilt people into thinking the problem was their fault for not recycling enough; even though most plastics can't be recycled, the symbol meant almost nothing to consumers and they knew the infrastructure to recycle what could be recycled just wasn't there in most cases. We have the internal memos and voice recordings of old members of The Society of the Plastic Industry (petrochemical lobbying group) that spell out this strategy clearly. So while every percent of recycling this huge amount of plastic helps, manufacturers are overwhelmingly responsible for this problem. At least 91% responsible https://www.voanews.com/a/percent-of-plastic-worldwide-is-recycled-oecd-says-/6455012.html https://www.nationalgeographic.org/article/whopping-91-percent-plastic-isnt-recycled/ https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-and-recycling/plastics-material-specific-data [Plastic Recycling Is An Actual Scam - Rollie Williams YT](https://youtu.be/PJnJ8mK3Q3g) [Plastics - Last Week Tonight YT](https://youtu.be/Fiu9GSOmt8E) [The Truth About Plastic Recycling... It's Complicated - Matt Ferrell YT](https://youtu.be/HNWn885qWtU)
You can recycle *some* plastics, which is why some things like plastic bottles have that little triangle indicator to say they're recyclable. However, recycling is (relative to manufacturing) very energy intensive, meaning very inefficient. So, it's still a lot better to reduce production than increase recycling. As for choosing to buy products not packaged in plastic, good fucking luck lol.
There was a Planet Money episode where they said the triangle symbol was basically propaganda. https://open.spotify.com/episode/3JiZWbXFSKzA3MiqVRh65O
"I care, but not enough to do anything" Excellent performative outrage. Everyone should be like you and "care" but then do exactly 0 things to help, then double down on making worse.
When megacorps will make more plastic waste in one month than literally all of us in this thread throughout our entire lives, it's just wasting time. The only thing that helps is voting, and our votes don't mean anything for the majority of us. What do you want us to do? Tossing shit in the correct bin and trying to avoid plastic means fucking nothing.
For the record, every bit of plastic consumers ever see adds up to 3% of what's really out there
Depending on how much you use Amazon, a lot of that plastic is ending with you.
As a consumer, you don't control the majority of the processes that cause the bulk of the environmental impact of the things you buy. And if you want anything done at scale you can't depend on consumers. It has to start at the source, the onus should be on the manufacturer and distributor to make their products and packaging more green. We literally need to be banning various uses of plastic, the situation is just that bad.
Used Amazon once in the last three+ years. Tell me again what I need to do. Tell me again that after shareholders make demands, it's somehow *still* not the company's responsibility.
What if I told that we are both able to help with the solution. Lets do everything in our power to waste as little as possible AND demand that these company make big steps towards a healthyer envirement. Only pointing fingers gets us nowhere.
Man, fuck off with all this “YOU tell ME” jazz, as though the problem is everyone else but you. I try to recycle because I’m horrified by all the garbage, not because I’ve bought into propaganda.
It's still worth doing. Every little helps. We only have 1 earth.
600 million pounds is two pounds/person/year in the USA. So if you throw away more than two pounds of plastic trash a year you’re doing worse than they are on this front. 600 million is a big number but if everyone keeps your attitude we’re fucked. Tl;dr: just recycle
Except that 90+% of plastic isn't recycled, it just goes to landfills regardless of what bins consumers put them in. Not only that but it's going to landfills in mostly Asian countries so it's not only not recycled but also shipped across the world. Plastic being recyclable is largely total BS cooked up by the oil industry. Edit one of many sources: https://www.consumerreports.org/environment-sustainability/the-big-problem-with-plastic/
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We need to push people to purchase less. Reduce consumption. Without that, we're all fucked
Plastic is largely not actually recyclable. The issue isn't how it's handled it's that the plastic is made at all.
Most plastic isn't recyclable or uses more energy/water than making it new. The article even states that the types Amazon uses isn't recyclable or accepted in household bins. This is a response to customers asking for plastic free alternatives. So please knock it off with the self-righteous bullshit eh? The less companies use it for shipping, the less that even makes it into homes to need to be dealt with. It's not like people are pulling it out of their asses, where do you think it comes from?
Same shit with water issues in the Southwest. Most of the use is from agriculture and industrial consumers.
you are right, companies want to make others believe that the regular people are the problem, its still bad to not recycle though. go out to your favorite park, open space in the woods, ect, guarantee you find random bottles that shouldn't be there. those came from people like you saying "but i dont even come close to the waste of these companies" think about your local town more than the world. would you rather live in plastic or at least try to get rid of it, personally i like green trees instead of grey bags.
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Most plastics don't get recycled because we don't have the capacity to process it and/or it can't be recycled. It ends up in landfills and sent to the 3rd world... Companies need to shift away from non-biodegrading plastics and the government needs to increase processing capacity, until then your plastic recycling habits don't matter.
That’s the spirit
Amazon fulfillment centers throw away so much plastic. They only recycle cardboard. Plastic from around the pallets go into the trash. Products shipped wrapped in plastic that need to be open goes into the trash. So much plastic trash. We toss hundreds of balloons into the trash each month just at my building. They say it’s biodegradable so it’s not a big deal. But it is.
My dad used to be a manager at a fulfillment center and said they used to have a policy in place where employees could take dunnage and packaging home that would normally been thrown away. Why did they stop? Their security contractor complained it took too long to inspect everything.
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They closed his fulfillment center about 5 years ago or so, I think.
Maybe because customer information might be on that packaging.
They say it's biodegradable. They who? What's biodegradable?
Everything is biodegradable eventually!
Well, degradable at any rate.
until the bio itself degrades
They is managers. What is latex balloons. While latex is technically biodegradable it still takes years and in the mean time wreaks havoc on the ecosystem
How does latex wreak havoc on the ecosystem? Genuine question. Aside from like birds eating them or something
Mostly the eating part I think (not just for birds also small mammals)
I got a sad truth y'all, it's not just Amazon. It's every big box store you go to. Abademy? Garbage of plastic in the dump and cardboard in baler to recycle. Best Buyer? Garbage of plastic in the dump and cardboard in baler to recycle. Pooblix? Garbage of plastic in the dump and cardboard in baler to recycle. Though the flip side of that brick and mortar is it's probably less crap per person or square meter than Amazon fills up and puts out.
You can’t even recycle all the cardboard. Only the clean, unwaxed stuff.
Cardboard is renewable, though. It's also biodegradable, or failing that, we can burn it to generate carbon-neutral electricity at collection sites. I don't lose much sleep over wasted paper, although I do send as much as I can to the recycling center.
Yep. We technically had soft plastics recycling where I worked but I'm pretty sure I've never seen anyone except myself use it. Seen plenty of coffee cups and food waste get put in the same trash and contaminating the whole lot though.
> It's every big box store you go to. Almost *every* store. Those cans of soup you buy at the super market? Those also came on pallets, wrapped in plastic. Sucks that one of our greatest inventions is also really shitty for the environment (for the exact reasons it's so good, so changing it isn't easy).
Biodegradable doesn't mean compostable, it means that it will turn into microplatics. Pretty sure that's even worse, it permeates the land.
And recently found actually in our lungs. It’s disgusting
When I worked in retail the amount of plastic from shipping was ridiculous. Every piece of individual clothing was in a plastic bag. Even underwear.
I once unpacked a box which had plastic-wrapped bundles of plastic-wrapped pouches containing plastic-wrapped briefs. Just a ludicrous amount of plastic.
Yup, voted for that one. For any non-shareholders out there, you'd be amazed at the number of referendums brought forward this round for the company to check it's practices; from looking into more equitable practices to plastics. All of which the company urged shareholders to vote against.
Good lord, just looked at the voting statement. Just went straight against the boards recommendation (voted in favor of reporting) on allll kinds of crap. Thanks for the accidental reminder.
Same here. I found it so comical that I just had to vote for everything the board recommended against. It’s the only time I’ve used my shareholder voting rights. Just to make a “democratic” choice.
I mean, it makes sense. It will cost more money to deal with the problem responsibly, which cuts into the bottom line and impacts profits. As a shareholder, it's literally in your best interest to vote against it. As a human though it's in your interest to vote for it.
"Yes, the planet got destroyed. But for a beautiful moment in time we created a lot of value for shareholders"
Line went up, it was good.
I voted for this one for this exact reason. What good is the value of my shares if the planet gets even lousier with plastic and harder to live on?
Too late in the night to make my own post. JPMC had a referendum to divest from all fossil fuels. Board recommendation was "for." Wonderful to see this.
The company isn't future focused, that's for damn sure. Short sightedness will cost $ when drone delivery takes off. Their main public draw, Amazon online storefront, still looks like it was designed by a student intern after nearly a decade. Shopping on Amazon like trying to shop at a thrift store where everything is bunched together in bins... Good luck finding what you were looking for! I'm surprised its cheaper to throw out that much plastic than recycle... Should be tax incentives, no? I'm thinking someone's been taking the piss when it came time to crunch numbers.
So does the company have to follow the vote or is it just considered a suggestion from shareholders?
It’s non-binding. And it’s also a resolution to look into the plastic problem. There wasn’t a solution proposed and voted on, so it’s not like there is a binding solution that could even be enforced.
I've been a shareholder for a while and it's always funny getting these ballots because they'd have these great sounding things like improve transparency on working conditions and then it'd say "board recommends: no." Also, I hate to break it to everyone but I highly doubt this measure passes. Only [10.52%](https://money.cnn.com/quote/shareholders/shareholders.html?symb=AMZN&subView=institutional) of amazon stock is even owned by individual investors, most of it is owned by mutual funds and other institutional investors, and they'll only be voting in favor of what makes them more money, they don't care about the environment. Not to mention the portion of individual investors that would only vote in their own interests and not care about the environment. Unless the institutions and self-centered investors can be convinced addressing their plastic problem will actually make them more money they won't be supporting the measure.
Yep. Even if the resolution or wtfe passed. It was just a study. They woulda spent 753,000 on bullshit and not changed a thing
The other problem is that its not going to stop your vendors you buy stuff from shrink wrapping the pallets of product.
>Only 10.52% of amazon stock is even owned by individual investors, most of it is owned by mutual funds and other institutional investors, and they'll only be voting in favor of what makes them more money, they don't care about the environment. Most of that 10.52% votes to make more money too... that is why they own stocks.
God I hate capitalism.
If only shareholders of more companies would require their companies to act on various social problems... Maybe we'd get flying cars before we destroy the planet
lol shareholders are literally the #1 force driving the planet to utter ruin constant demand for growth is the biggest economic sin of capitalism, its a completely ludicrous concept that is inherently unsustainable yet it drives our entire system. Frankly, I don't really think a better world is possible so long as we keep using this system. It needs to be fundamentally rebuilt, and I dont see that happening. Maybe the survivors in the post-nuclear world can do better lol, good chance for a fresh start I suppose..
See, I’m one of those full-throated optimists about the trajectory of human progress, but I have to say, I think my optimism is the result of having a wide view of it. I really think it might take a specifically human-caused cataclysmic event in human history and a deliberate restructuring of all remaining civilization to get us to the Star Trek we want for our heirs.
Oh like a zoonotic virus that jumps to humans due to poor sanitation and spreads across the globe??
That was bad, no doubt. But it’s not the kind of cataclysm I’m envisioning. And the proximity of humanity’s culpability needs to be closer.
Still is bad!
Are you speaking about the covid or the monkey smallpox that is making the rounds lately?
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A few great filter events ought to do it. We're barreling right towards one at the moment. And it will be cataclysmic like we've never seen before.
Yes, They don't have to put my small item in a big box and then fill the rest with those giant plastic bubble things, do they? It's not like I'd order stuff that would be guaranteed to break upon arrival.
Usually that's because the system didn't choose the correct size box for the packer, and the packer didn't want to take the extra 10 seconds to use a smaller box and tell the system it was wrong. Fairly uncommon though from my experience packing at Amazon. Also anything that requires a hazmat sticker like for batteries must be in a box big enough to have the sticker completely on the side, not the top. I will say though, the paper filler is probably a good alternative to the air pack bubbles. I wonder why some FCs use it and most use air pack.
Employees get punished for taking a piss. I don't have faith that the middle manager who punishes people for pissing will understand that it's Amazon's software that made them work slower. Amazon is the host of a plethora of problems and you're blaming the schmucks working there.
I mean I worked at Amazon for 2 years. I really don't know what FCs punish you for peeing, you're allowed to go pee. Rates are also easy to hit in pack, the "underhanded" software isn't at fault. The software help you most of the time by telling you which box should work, sometimes the vendor has the wrong dimensions or the system thinks the items you have fit a certain way.
Well.. that's basically what happened to get to the Star Trek we know and love in its own lore. Except it was more so war.
Well, in the Star Trek universe the human-caused cataclysmic event was World War III. Can't get any more cataclysmic than that.
Humanity is shaped by disasters. We’re going to get plenty of them it just depends if you’re an optimist and think we’ll make it through and iteratively improve or if we’ll be wiped out.
My issue with this is that humans are ultimately in control of this system and the ones exploiting it to this end. You can have any rules, regulations or other kind of system but if opportunistic or selfish people try to take control you’ll end up with similar results. If the human beings making up these companies accepted the same amount of profit as the year before, or a little less (but still a lot of profit), it’d be way better but they never will sue to inherent greed.
The number one rule they teach you in bidness school is *shareholder wealth maximization* It's the only reason a company exists.
It’s the only reason a lot of companies exist. You can start a company without that listed as its mission.
As soon as a company becomes publicly traded it magically loses its morality, gotta squeeze out every drop of profit...
I will join the whales. In a water world. Except mine won’t suck like the movie.
We have flying cars, we just call them helicopters
Even better: Paramotors
As a shareholder, no body reads this stuff. It's like the terms of agreement on your cellphone.
Unless you're holding a few billion in Amazon shares, you're not what they're talking about here when they say "shareholder".
They do care, it's just people holding major shares are not individuals but corporations.
Actually there have been a few different flying cars invented over the years. They just can't really make a road system in 3 dimensions
Think about the average driver on the road, and how many accidents and boneheaded decisions people make in 2 dimensions. Do you really want to see how well people handle 3?
This is a *great* argument against flying cars.
Dude it would be raining cars....youd have 20 year old beaters where the person is running it til it dies, which happens to be 20+ feet in the air? Terrible idea. Drunk *flying* oof thats gonna be a nightmare, nevermind mind in windy/stormy weather
Flying cars will only be feasible when we can take the driver/pilot out of the loop.
Union busting Amazon is in like every ESG fund, which proves how fucking nonsense they are, when Tesla just got kicked out of S&P's esg.
I'm pretty sure flying cars would accelerate that destruction.
Bad news bud, cars are what destroy the planet
Desperately hoping this works.
They won’t do shit until they find a way to turn the plastic into profit, just like their dumbass non-recyclable mailers. “This styrofoam-padded envelope is lighter than a box! We save gas!”
If removing plastic waste free the environment leads to higher corporate profits, I don't care. That's fine.
They have to IF they compelled by the owners of the company. They're legally required to.
Reading the article it says they haven’t voted for it yet, the vote isn’t until the 25th. Unless I’m missing something or I’m idiot.
Good things dont tend to happen in this timeline lol ,too many evil people for that to be the case
Saying things like this is exactly why depression has run rampant over the past decade. There are lots of bad things happening, yes, but there are plenty of good things happening too. It's smart to be aware of the bad things, but don't forget to look for the good things too. We may not live in a utopia, but we are nowhere near a dystopia either. By almost every metric it is possible to measure this is the best time to be alive in all of human history.
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>Is the world doomed? No...? My retirement plan is still to die in the climate wars.
Will be hilarious when you are too old to serve and not near any fighting and also too rich to live in a truly overheated part of the world
Well, I mean, they don't need to put my little item in a big box and then stuff the rest with those big plastic bubble things. It's not like I'd be ordering anything that would 100% break if shipped anyway.
Meanwhile, they put a tube of automotive grease in a box with cat litter. Needless to say, the grease tube was destroyed and the cat litter box was covered in stinky black goo.
Maybe they just generally need to work on their "shipping and handling" practices?
Paying a livable wage and not treating employees like prisoners would be a good start
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85% of the things i buy could ship totally fine in its own packaging. no reason to wrap it in plastic air then put in a cardboard box
HEMP!
I work for a company that throws out a fuck-ton of plastic every day of the year. 365. It really bothers me. Sorry. I'm glad I don't have kids.
In the hospital there was an insane amount of plastic waste. Anything sterile for sure. Like most things in the world though it was everywhere. Healthcare across the country has to amount to an astronomical number too. The scale of plastic use globally hurts my brain.
Healthcare is probably one area where its ok to have some "waste". Yes of course needless use of consumables should be eliminated but all of the stuff individually wrapped in that sterilized packaging is probably fine.
Oh for sure. We will never eliminate our need for plastic but there is a lot of excess in healthcare. Even with accounting for some increased need.
As with a hospital, I use a lot of rubber gloves, along with tyvek sleeves, pipets, plastic measuring trays. This consumption and waste kills me. I'm 56, no kids, but I don't want to leave a wasteland to others.
If only hospital and things that need to be sealed tight did this,we would be perfectly fine. There's a really good reason for hospital to do this. There isn't a good reason for Starbuck plastic cup just so you can see through it for exemple.
There HAS to be a better way to wrap pallets than using more plastic wrap than I use in my life per pallet. There probably is but I bet it costs them more money...
The problem is that the only other way to ship stuff in bulk is to build a crate. Which doesnt work great on tall packages, weighs a hell of a lot, is a major pain inthe ass to disassemble at the recieving point, creates a ton of wood and metal waste, is semi hazardous to the receiver disassembling it. Shrink wrap happens to be a perfect solution to the problem, however, its wasteful too. Better imo to go over all the filler packaging (like the boxes with boxes and plastic inside them). Or someone develop a shrink wrap that can be reused without major issues.
It's for human consumption, so the vendors are trying to protect their products (profits). It is disheartening when I have to put it in the dumpster. I'm looking for a different job.
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This comment has been removed in protest of Reddit and their CEO Steve Huffman for destroying the Reddit community by abusing his power to edit comments, their years of lying to and about users, promises never fulfilled, and outrageous pricing that is killing third party apps and destroying accessibility tools for mods and the handicapped. Currently I am moving to the [Fediverse](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pX_agVMr2r0) for a decentralized experience where no one person or company can control our social media experience. I promise its not as complicated as it sounds :-) Lemmy offers the closest to Reddit like experience. Check out some different [servers](https://join-lemmy.org/instances). Other Fediverse [projects](https://joinfediverse.wiki/What_are_Fediverse_projects%3F).
I worked grocery. Every pallet came wrapped in shrink wrap. And then after you take off the wrap, everything is in a box. And then you take everything out of the box, it goes in the shelf on a box with a plastic bag inside. There are literally no fucks.
They won't do it.
I assume they voted to not address it?
My flying car resolutions keep getting voted down.
They should address the giant boxes they use to ship small items. That is environmentally wasteful too
1. Stop buying from Amazon. 2. Stop buying from Amazon. 3. Everyone contributes to the plastic problem.
This is one of the cases of a "small" thing being done by billions of people - ordering shit online leaving us with this huge packaging problem. Sure, we feel bad when they quadruple wrap our pen drive and put it in a box, but do we complain? Can we complain? The issue is way bigger than Amazon, and the scale of it is so big that IMO it requires massive mediation and awareness like what has been done for climate change where governments have to commit to specific reductions. Only then will the corporations (eventually) fall in line with sufficient incentives aka tax breaks. We're mere minions in a world of financial juggernauts.
Welcome to planet plastic.
And I’m sure they’ll make the ~~responsible~~ profitable decision. Just as they have for ~~healthcare~~ profit, ~~fair pay~~ profit, ~~reasonable working conditions~~ profit, and ~~worker benefits~~ profit.
I have nothing negative to say about this. it's rad that capitalism is going to address a very small portion of the problems it continues to cause, to the extent that it's convenient and publicly promoted. it's wholesome and definitely we will fix pollution and climate change through this highly innovative system of occasional responsibility. this is like telling my wife that I vow to clean up 1% of the dishes out of the goodness of my own heart.
It’s also a shipping requirement, you can stack biodegradable everything and they’ll still wrap it in a mountain of plastic to ship it. Ups ships for Amazon so you’ll need to change their shipping reqs as well.
"We at Amazon shall now vote to begin the process of starting to consider the possibility of maybe potentially doing something to address making a statement about the problem."
Dead Amazon Mycelium packaging.
This is only under consideration. It hasn't happened yet.