Ireland's Plastic Bag Tax

In an important scene from the 1999 movie American Beauty, two characters—Jane and Ricky—watch footage of a plastic bag dancing in the wind. That there's beauty all over the place, even in garbage, seems to overwhelm Ricky: "Sometimes there's so much beauty in the world, I feel like I can't take it, like my heart's going to cave in."

Unlike Ricky, Dubliners have to live without the heartbreaking splendor of airborne garbage. Plastic bags nearly disappeared from Ireland's cities after the government began taxing them in 2002. The tax, 33 cents per bag, was enough motivation for most shoppers to replace plastic bags with reusable cloth bags. Ireland's experience illustrates a basic principle of taxation: if you want less of something--like the not-so-biodegradable, sewer-clogging plastic bag--tax it. Read Elisabeth Rosenthal's New York Times article to learn more about Ireland's bag tax.

Discussion Questions

1. There's nothing like a green tax to bring out our inner-environmentalists. As Rosenthal points out, after the tax passed, plastic bag use became socially unacceptable in Ireland. In what way does the tax lower the barrier to adopting a disapproving attitude toward plastic bag use?

2. Ohio issues yellow and red license plates to drivers convicted of drunk driving (apparently, Ohio officials didn't give much thought to tourists from the great state of New Mexico). Can you think of other situations or even laws that are governed largely by the threat of disapproval from others?

3. How is the Irish government's campaign against plastic bags similar to government campaigns against tobacco? In what ways do cigarette and plastic bag taxes increase efficiency for society as a whole?

4. Taxing bad behavior can be good, but implementation and enforcement are issues. It'd be relatively easy to cut down on paper waste from ATM receipts because the fee can be collected electronically at the site of the transaction. Why does a plastic bag tax that works remarkably well in the digitized supermarkets of Ireland run into implementation problems among the vendors and mom and pop shops in China?

Labels: Taxes, Incentives, Market Failure, Externalities, Environment