Poll: A New Tax for Plastic Supermarket Bags May Be in Your Future
A New Jersey Senate Committee voted this week to approve a new 5-cent fee for plastic supermarket bags which will go to fund environmental cleanup.
A new Senate bill could have you paying more for plastic bags at the grocery store. The Carryout Bag Reduction and Recycling Act was approved by a 4-0 vote of the Senate Environmental Energy Committee on Monday that would require stores to charge a 5-cent fee per plastic food bag at the checkout aisle beginning in 2014. On the other hand, the bill would also give a 5-cent rebate or credit for every reusable bag provided by a shopper. In addition, the bill would require stores to only offer recyclable carryout bags by 2015. The bill will soon be taken up in the Assembly, according to NJ.com. The 5-cent fee would go toward the Department of Environmental Protection’s Barnegat Bay Restoration Fund, which works to improve the water …
Mimi Michalski
4:14 pm on Wednesday, December 19, 2012
In addition, our store, Stop-n-Shop, has more and more self-checkout counters. How would the tax on plastic bags be enforced there? more ›