The Pros and Cons of Plastic Bag Bans

Plastic bag litter can be harmful to the environment, but will your food be exposed to bacteria
without them?

ByJon Behm| Last Updated:07/13/2022

The Facts on Plastic Bag Bans

In 2020, statewide plastic bag laws became active in Maine, New York, Oregon and
Vermont, with Connecticut and Delaware joining in 2021. This comes in response to
California passing legislation to ban plastic bags in November of 2016. With Hawaii —
which has a de facto ban due to all of the state’s counties imposing restrictions — added, that
brings the total number of states with plastic bag banning laws to eight.

Across 23 states, over 200 counties and municipalities have their own bans in place.
Additionally, the U.S. territories of American Samoa, Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana
Islands, Guam and the U.S. Virgin Islands have enacted plastic bag bans.

If over 22% of the country’s population has adopted a bag-free lifestyle, should other states
follow suit? To answer that question, we’ll examine the arguments on both sides of the
debate.

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Cons of Plastic Bags

Pros of Plastic Bags
Plastic Bags Today

What Are the Cons of Plastic Bags?

 1. Plastic Bags Contaminate Food Sources

Those in favor of banning plastic bags argue that it would be one of the most effective ways
to reduce the volume of plastic waste in the ocean. This would have major health benefits for
both sea life and humans.

Did You Know?

Sea life consumes up to 24,000 tons of microscopic plastic per year.

According to EcoWatch, 10 metric tons of plastic fragments, including grocery bags, wash
out to sea in the Los Angeles area every day. Once in the ocean, those fragments break down
into smaller, nearly microscopic pieces that are consumed by sea life — an estimated 12,000-
24,000 tons per year — contaminating the food chain from the bottom up.

“I think it goes without saying that plastics (bags included) are an enormous problem in terms
of litter, mostly because plastic trash is ubiquitous, and plastic does not decay in a lifetime,”
said Elizabeth Mullen Matteson, founder of The Litter Project. “The amount of plastic litter
just grows and grows, especially in our oceans. This is terribly dangerous to the eco systems
that provide food to billions of people.”

A study conducted in 2015 by researchers at UC Davis found that one-quarter of fish sold at
California markets contained whole or fibrous plastic in their stomachs. Further research is
needed to confirm whether the chemicals found in plastic can transfer to the parts of fish
most frequently eaten by people.

2. Plastic Bags Take Up To 1,000 Years to Decompose

Unlike reusable fabric bags, plastic bags can take lifetimes to biodegrade. Over that time,
their light weight allows them to be carried long distances, causing environmental
havoc along the way.

“Exactly what happens to a plastic bag when it is littered depends very much on where it
enters the environment and the mechanisms that cause it to travel,” said Patrick Chandler,
Education Consultant for The Washed Ashore Project. “On a rainy day in Portland, the bag
could be washed into a drainage pipe that would lead it to the Columbia River and into the
ocean. On a windy day in Arizona, the bag might get stuck on a cactus where it is held until it
photodegrades.”

But no matter where a bag ends up, Chandler explains that it can cause long-term harm to the
surrounding ecosystem. “The bag will exist in the environment for years because plastic
doesn’t biodegrade. Exactly how many years and how that plays out again depends on where
it starts and where it ends up.”
 3. Plastic Bags Are Hard to Recycle

“One reason why plastic bags have become such an ecological burden is our way of dealing
with them at the end of their lifetime,” said Sara Slavikova, co-founder of Greentumble. “We
keep producing more and more, but did not implement efficient recycling programs —
particularly because their recycling is difficult.”

Did You Know? 

According to the EPA, nearly 93 billion plastic bags are not recycled each year.

Further, the U.S. recycled less than 9% of plastic material in 2018. With roughly 102.1
billion plastic bagsused yearly by Americans, that means 92.81 billion plastic bags are not
recycled per year.

Plastic bags can’t be sorted from other materials by the machinery at recycling facilities.
They often get stuck in conveyor belts, jam equipment and delay the entire sorting system,
making it impractical for plastic bags to be collected with curbside recycling.

As a result, some grocery stores provide collection bins to properly recycle plastic bags, but
it’s easy for shoppers to forget to bring them back.

What Are the Pros of Plastic Bags?

1. Plastic Bag Production Is More Environmentally Friendly

Reusable alternatives are a major focus of the plastic ban debate. But how eco-friendly are
fabric shopping bags in comparison to plastic bags?

Did You Know?

 A fabric bag must be used 40+ times to match a plastic bag’s environmental footprint.

A 2018 study by the Ministry of Environment and Food of Denmark showed that the
manufacturing and disposal of plastic bags had a lower environmental impact than six
alternate bags offered as a replacement at most supermarkets. It stated that each alternate
material would have to be reused between 35 and 7,100 times to negate the pollution of its
production and to equal that of a plastic bag that has only been used one time.

Environmental Footprint Comparison: Alternate Bags vs. Plastic Bags

Reusable Bag Material Number of Uses

Polyester polyethylene terephthalate 35
Biopolymer 42
Paper 43
Woven polypropylene 45
Composite materials 870
Conventional cotton 7,100

A related argument for keeping plastic bags in checkout lanes involves their convenience. For
retailers, they are cheap, easy to store, and simple to open and fill. Many consumers reuse
plastic bags in various ways, such as lining their bathroom garbage cans.

2. The Plastic Industry Employs Nearly 1 Million Americans

Convenience, however, is not the only argument against banning plastic bags. As it turns out,
the companies that manufacture the bags themselves, such as Formosa Plastics and Novolex,
employ thousands of people in plants and factories across the U.S. Every new plastic bag
ban, critics argue, raises the risk of widespread layoffs.

Did You Know?

Nearly 31,000 Americans are employed to make plastic bags.

In 2017, the plastic products industry employed 989,000 nationwide, making it the eighth
largest industry in the United States. Of those employees, 30,900 are directly involved in the
making of plastic bags.

On top of that, some stores in areas with anti-plastic bag ordinances have noticed a decrease
in sales — shoppers are limited to purchasing only what will fit inside their reusable bags or
simply choose to shop at a neighboring town that still uses plastic bags. As a result, some
stores are unable to hire more people.
 3. Plastic Bags Reduce Food Safety Risks

While fabric bags are great for transporting dry foods, they can be quick to absorb messes,
leading to undesirable odors and potential for bacteria growth. In fact, a joint study at the
University of Arizona and Loma Linda University in California discovered the presence of
coliform bacteria in 51% of the 84 reusable grocery bags tested, with E. coli present in 8%.

To avoid these inconveniences and reduce the risk of contamination, many shoppers request
separate plastic bags for certain items at the checkout.

Sara Slavikova from Greentumble explains that “plastic bags and wrapping overall have
become widely accepted. It is approved as a standard (hygienic) packaging material.”

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The State of Plastic Bag Bans Today

With eight states approving plastic bag laws — six of which have come since 2017 — the
movement against plastic bags continues to gain support. However, with each ban approved
comes opposition as other states have taken measures to keep plastic bags in stores.

Fifteen states — Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota,
Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin — have
laws that ban cities and counties from enacting their own plastic bag bans that are being
enforced to varying degrees of success. The topic is also being discussed in Alabama and
South Carolina.
Despite opposition, the movement to ban the bag is gaining momentum in legislatures across
the country, with advocates citing the success of California’s plastic bag law as a sign that
other states can get rid of plastic bags without harming local economies or businesses. In fact,
some of the states that have prohibited bag bans are considering repealing the laws.

But for now, most of us still have to answer that age-old question: “Will that be paper or
plastic?”