I agree and think that these sorts of laws create hassle without much benefit. There are probably a hundred more impactful things that could make a measurable impact in the earth without pushing cost and hassle on people dealing with enough of both.

In my county, (not in California) a former fat guy turned crossfitter on the legislature pushed bans on all sorts of stuff, including transfat. Counties only control regulation for food places less than 20,000 square feet, so mr. healthy food put every bakery in county out of business (literally) and left us with factory manufactured crap in supermarkets, etc.

The point is, flashy nonsense doesn’t help when you have real problems.

I have two objections to this post:

1. No numbers provided, in terms of actual impacts on poor people. Just a vague angry waving of fists and calling drafters of bag bans "assholes".

2. Carbon footprint isn't the only thing that's cut down with bag bans. Plastic waste itself is a massive problem - plastic is forever and it's getting everywhere, including our water. In my home city of Mumbai, India, plastic bags choke up drains and sewers, and contribute to monsoon flooding every year - and it's definitely not the rich that suffer most when the city floods. Reducing the amount of plastic that's produced might even be worth a slight increase in carbon emissions in the long run. That is if we can find emissions savings elsewhere, which luckily, we can by cutting out the McMansions and SUVs mentioned in the post.

In mostly poor communities, I'd support even free paper bags along with a plastic bag ban. In richer communities, yeah a plastic bag ban + non-free paper bags can be construed as "anti-poor" but virtually everything else in those communities already is anti-poor anyway (minimum plot size zoning, walkability, public transit availability etc).

It just makes my blood boil to see the way groceries are bagged in communities with no bag bans - it feels like they use a new bag per item.

> The people who are hurt by this are people who walk to the store, bike to the store or take public transit. These people now need to buy a backpack or something to carry their stuff.

I don't understand this part. When they leave the store after shopping, they will be carrying full bags, so they have to have some way of carrying full bags when they walk, bike, or take public transit home from the store.

An empty bag is a lot easier to carry than a full bag, so why wouldn't whatever method they use to carry full bags away from the store work for carrying empty bags to the store?

I was homeless in California at the time the bag ban became law. I did buy a $3 backpack for shopping. In fact, I bought a series of them because I have a serious medical condition and cleanliness is a big issue in my life.

If you are in a car, tossing a bag in the trunk or back seat is no big deal. In fact, you can just leave one there by default. But if you are walking, biking or taking transit, you need to remember to take it, you have to carry it and keep track of it. It requires more organization, more mental energy, and more physical energy. You don't have to plan ahead, keep track of things, etc if there will be free bags provided at the time if purchase. This also means that spontaneous purchases are problematic for those without a car in a way they are not for those with a car.

Even if you aren't homeless and don't have the cleanliness concerns I have, it is sort of a death by a thousand paper cuts for people who are typically already poor, overburdened and struggling to cope.

There is also this theory that it's caused a Hepatis outbreak: http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/hepatitis-crisis/sd...

People who are homeless would often use plastic bags as a bathroom, and then throw it in the trash. No more plastic bags, so they can't do that...

Not sure what real evidence there is for it, but I always love an unintended consequences story.

I'm not so sure that's a cautionary tale about unintended consequences as much as an illustration of the lack of public toilets. Do we really want people doing their business in plastic bags?

I'm a proponent of the idea that the bag ban is a contributing factor to the hepatitis epidemic. I don't think it is the only factor. The epidemic also started about the same time the multi year California drought broke. That was an especially wet winter, with deadly storms and flooding. I think the heavy rains likely also contributed to the epidemic.

There are probably other factors as well. I believe homelessness has been on the rise in Southern California. Concentration of poverty tends to go bad places healthwise.