California Considers $1,000 Fine for Waiters Offering Unsolicited Plastic Straws

[The Deadman]

http://reason.com/blog/2018/01/25/california-bill-would-criminalize-restau

Ian Calderon wants restaurateurs to think long and hard before giving you a straw.

Calderon, the Democratic majority leader in California's lower house, has introduced a bill to stop sit-down restaurants from offering customers straws with their beverages unless they specifically request one. Under Calderon's law, a waiter who serves a drink with an unrequested straw in it would face up to 6 months in jail and a fine of up to $1,000.

"We need to create awareness around the issue of one-time use plastic straws and its detrimental effects on our landfills, waterways, and oceans," Calderon explained in a press release.

This isn't just Calderon's crusade. The California cities of San Luis Obispo and Davis both passed straws-on-request laws last year, and Manhattan Beach maintains a prohibition on all disposable plastics. And up in Seattle, food service businesses won't be allowed to offer plastic straws or utensils as of July.

The Los Angeles Times has gotten behind the movement, endorsing straws-on-request policies in an editorial that also warned that "repetitive sucking may cause or exacerbate wrinkles on the lips or around the mouth." Celebrity astronomer Neil DeGrasse Tyson (always up for a little chiding) and Entourage star Adrian Grenier have appeared in videos where an octopus slaps them in the face for using a plastic straw.

The actual number of straws being used is unclear. Calderon, along with news outlets writing about this issue—from CNN to the San Francisco Chronicle—unfailingly state that Americans use 500 million plastic straws a day, many of them ending up in waterways and oceans. The 500 million figure is often attributed to the National Park Service; it in turn got it from the recycling company Eco-Cycle.

Eco-Cycle is unable to provide any data to back up this number, telling Reason that it was relying on the research of one Milo Cress. Cress—whose Be Straw Free Campaign is hosted on Eco-Cycle's website—tells Reason that he arrived at the 500 million straws a day figure from phone surveys he conducted of straw manufacturers in 2011, when he was just 9 years old.

Cress, who is now 16, says that the National Restaurant Association has endorsed his estimates in private correspondence. This may well be true, but the only references to the 500 million figure on the association's website again points back to the work done by Cress.

More important than how many straws Americans use each day is how many wind up in waterways. We don't know that figure either. The closest we have is the number of straws collected by the California Costal Commission during its annual Coastal Cleanup Day: a total of 835,425 straws and stirrers since 1988, or about 4.1 percent of debris collected.

Squishy moderates on the straw issue have pushed paper straws, which come compostable at only eight times the price. Eco-Cycle skews a bit more radical, with their "Be Straw Free" campaign—sponsored in part by reusable straw makers—that urges the adoption of glass or steel straws. Because we all know how good steel smelting is for the environment.

In any case, criminalizing unsolicited straws seems like a rather heavy-handed approach to the problem, especially since we don't actually know how big a problem it is. But don't take my word for that. Ask Milo Cress.

"If people are forced not to use straws, then they won't necessarily see that it's for the environment," he tells Reason. "They'll just think it's just another inconvenience imposed on them by government."

Update: Reason spoke with Voleck Taing, a senior assistant to Assemblyman Calderon, who said they intend to amend the bill to remove the fines.

California has some weird people.

[ProphetofGanja]

If they feel that strongly about it why not just ban them altogether? Waiters shouldn't be in fear of going to jail while they bring people their drinks and try to remember if the patrons actually asked for a straw or not. Besides, petty people could then lie on the waiter and say they didn't ask for a straw

[plastroncafe]

My guess is because there are people who legitimately require the use of a straw, and banning them outright would create a hardship for them.

[newfan]

Have the straws on the bar in a container? The person can just grab one if they wish. Or....just do what they plan, straws by request only without the massive fine for an honest mistake.

[Sumac]

Ah, California.
A land where progress and insanity are married to each other.
(joke) (maybe)

[Andrew NDB]

Ah, California.
A land where progress and insanity are married to each other.
(joke) (maybe)

California has among the highest taxes in the nation. Its base sales tax rate of 7.25% is higher than that of any other state, and its top marginal income tax rate of 13.3% is the highest state income tax rate in the country. It also has the worst traffic in the country.

On top of it all, they also voted to become a "Sanctuary State" for all illegal immigrants coming over the border.

[plastroncafe]

And in 2015 it had the 6th largest GDP globally, putting it ahead of France, India, Italy, and Brazil.

(source) (https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/07/american-state-bigger-economy-than-india/)

So they're doing something right.

[Candy Kappa]

California has among the highest taxes in the nation. Its base sales tax rate of 7.25% is higher than that of any other state, and its top marginal income tax rate of 13.3% is the highest state income tax rate in the country. It also has the worst traffic in the country.

On top of it all, they also voted to become a "Sanctuary State" for all illegal immigrants coming over the border.

Wow that's some low taxes

[IndigoErth]

CA, I know you're a little weird, like slightly the U.S. version of Japan but in a different way, but look, you don't need to be THIS weird.


You know what I've had at Disney World? PAPER straws. DO THAT.

Or figure out how to make an edible candy variety that customers can snack on, take with them, or will at least brake down into nothing later.

[plastroncafe]

Or corn.
There are places around here that have corn-based plastic straws.
Don't we have a surplus of corn anyway?

[IndigoErth]

Yes, I was thinking along those lines but couldn't recall what it was made of, thank you. :)

[TigerClaw]

California is so weird, I can see why those that are supporting the New California movement want to be out.

[Andrew NDB]

I think we should let much of California secede and become the new capital of Mexico. Their legislature will surely Make Mexico Great Again.

[FredWolfLeonardo]

Whh not restrict their production rather than punish employees for selling them?

[Andrew NDB]

Whh not restrict their production rather than punish employees for selling them?

That's probably the idea. They couldn't ban production for whatever reason directly, so they create legislature that... makes it necessary (or at least creates an immediate push) to ban production.

[Refractive Reflections]

And in 2015 it had the 6th largest GDP globally, putting it ahead of France, India, Italy, and Brazil.

(source) (https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/07/american-state-bigger-economy-than-india/)

So they're doing something right.

They do have an extraordinary GDP, but they have the highest poverty rate in the country.


Guess which state has the highest poverty rate (http://www.politifact.com/california/statements/2017/jan/20/chad-mayes/true-california-has-nations-highest-poverty-rate-w/) in the country? Not Mississippi, New Mexico, or West Virginia, but California, where nearly one out of five residents is poor. That's according to the Census Bureau's Supplemental Poverty Measure, which factors in the cost of housing, food, utilities and clothing, and which includes noncash government assistance as a form of income.

Given robust job growth and the prosperity generated by several industries, it's worth asking why California has fallen behind, especially when the state's per-capita GDP increased approximately twice as much as the U.S. average over the five years ending in 2016 (12.5%, compared with 6.27%).

It's not as though California policymakers have neglected to wage war on poverty. Sacramento and local governments have spent massive amounts in the cause. Several state and municipal benefit programs overlap with one another; in some cases, individuals with incomes 200% above the poverty line receive benefits. California state and local governments spent nearly $958 billion from 1992 through 2015 on public welfare programs, including cash-assistance payments, vendor payments and "other public welfare," according to the Census Bureau. California, with 12% of the American population, is home today to about one in three of the nation's welfare recipients.

The generous spending, then, has not only failed to decrease poverty; it actually seems to have made it worse.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, some states — principally Wisconsin, Michigan, and Virginia — initiated welfare reform, as did the federal government under President Clinton and a Republican Congress. Tied together by a common thread of strong work requirements, these overhauls were a big success: Welfare rolls plummeted and millions of former aid recipients entered the labor force.

The state and local bureaucracies that implement California's antipoverty programs, however, resisted pro-work reforms. In fact, California recipients of state aid receive a disproportionately large share of it in no-strings-attached cash disbursements. It's as though welfare reform passed California by, leaving a dependency trap in place. Immigrants are falling into it: 55% of immigrant families in the state get some kind of means-tested benefits, compared with just 30% of natives.

Self-interest in the social-services community may be at fault. As economist William A. Niskanen explained back in 1971, public agencies seek to maximize their budgets, through which they acquire increased power, status, comfort and security. To keep growing its budget, and hence its power, a welfare bureaucracy has an incentive to expand its "customer" base. With 883,000 full-time-equivalent state and local employees in 2014, California has an enormous bureaucracy. Many work in social services, and many would lose their jobs if the typical welfare client were to move off the welfare rolls.

Further contributing to the poverty problem is California's housing crisis. More than four in 10 households spent more than 30% of their income on housing in 2015. A shortage of available units has driven prices ever higher, far above income increases. And that shortage is a direct outgrowth of misguided policies.

...

With a permanent majority in the state Senate and the Assembly, a prolonged dominance in the executive branch and a weak opposition, California Democrats have long been free to indulge blue-state ideology while paying little or no political price. The state's poverty problem is unlikely to improve while policymakers remain unwilling to unleash the engines of economic prosperity that drove California to its golden years.

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-jackson-california-poverty-20180114-story.html

[Leofan26]

Gee Thanks you guys nothing like having a fellow Californian feeling welcome here. You do know not everyone who lives there likes the same things our Governor throws out there? I hate that people outside of California think we all think in Union. Not that I should care about what other idiots online think, we have a guy on here who think he's always right no matter ( Cybs)

Why should I care?

FYI California owns the place that works on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and all other studios like Cartoon Network.

[ProphetofGanja]

Gee Thanks you guys nothing like having a fellow Californian feeling welcome here. You do know not everyone who lives there likes the same things our Governor throws out there? I hate that people outside of California think we all think in Union. Not that I should care about what other idiots online think, we have a guy on here who think he's always right no matter ( Cybs)

Why should I care?

FYI California owns the place that works on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and all other studios like Cartoon Network.

https://media1.tenor.com/images/b14d6e69ac60429b5355ced4e76f1146/tenor.gif?itemid=6261088

[Candy Kappa]

Fining waiters is just plain short sighted and dumb.

Either start charging for straws or get recycle friendly ones like paper straws

[plastroncafe]

They do have an extraordinary GDP, but they have the highest poverty rate in the country.


http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-jackson-california-poverty-20180114-story.html

Given the margin of error they share that top spot with Florida, according to the first link.

[The Deadman]

Gee Thanks you guys nothing like having a fellow Californian feeling welcome here. You do know not everyone who lives there likes the same things our Governor throws out there? I hate that people outside of California think we all think in Union. Not that I should care about what other idiots online think, we have a guy on here who think he's always right no matter ( Cybs)

Why should I care?

FYI California owns the place that works on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and all other studios like Cartoon Network.

Overreaction much? There's been far worse stuff that's probably been said on social media on this matter.

[sdp]

I think we should let much of California secede and become the new capital of Mexico. Their legislature will surely Make Mexico Great Again.

Mexicans are ashamed of Californian Mexicans and Californian Mexicans only think they "are proud/are" Mexican.

Literally two very different cultures, would not mix very well together.

[oldmanwinters]

Wait till folks in the drive-thru lanes realize they didn't get a straw for their to-go cup because they didn't ask for it...

And they spill drink all over themselves trying to chug from an open-container while driving...

And the excitement causes them to lose control of their vehicle and careen off the road...

And the ensuing lawsuits against the restaurants as being somehow responsible for negligence in the whole deal...

The vicious cycle. 'murica

[plastroncafe]

I don't mean to rain on the pearl-clutching parade here, but it's highly unlikely that this legislation will actually pass with a majority. If anything the point of it is to spark debate, which it has done.

[sdp]

Plastric straws need to be banned and those who may need them should bring their own. The fine is fine, if a waiter is too stupid to make the mistake then that's the consequence, albeit it should be the restaurant who pays for it and its up to them to deal with it however they want, I also think it's very difficult to enforce the fine and all around dumb. Just ban them

Sorry but the damage it does to the environment/ecosystem is much larger than anyone person's need. I don't see any of this happening in the near future, people only think in the short term and don't have any real care about the rest of the world they live in sadly.

[ProphetofGanja]

Plastric straws need to be banned and those who may need them should bring their own.

I agree

https://media.giphy.com/media/26DNh764m3hodRhjW/giphy.gif

[plastroncafe]

Mexicans are ashamed of Californian Mexicans and Californian Mexicans only think they "are proud/are" Mexican.

Literally two very different cultures, would not mix very well together.

It's my understanding that the something similar can be said about the Irish and Irish-Americans.

[Sumac]

I thought California was progressive state?
California green-lights initiative that’s a conspiracy theorist’s dream - it would ban chemicals, GMOs, smart meters, reverse vaccine law, end water treatment. (https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/02/california-green-lights-initiative-thats-a-conspiracy-theorists-dream/)

[ProactiveMan]

And in 2015 it had the 6th largest GDP globally, putting it ahead of France, India, Italy, and Brazil.

(source) (https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/07/american-state-bigger-economy-than-india/)

So they're doing something right.

Weren't they insolvent though?