ChrisMatrix1

Chris Kerr = Waste Management =



The concept of planned obsolescence has many pros and cons. Although it allows for high throughput of products resulting in a rapid economy, it creates tons of goods which need to be disposed of after their functions cease. Because of this, many support industries have sprung up to aid in this process. One industry which makes planned obsolescence possible is the waste management industry. This industry has been around since people began creating products, but only for about the last 100 has it shown significant signs of growth and privatization. Although the goal of the waste disposal industry is to “take care of what the rest of the world prefers not to think about” (Press), their definition of “take care” is to move it out of sight so that the “rest of the word” doesn’t see it anymore.

The waste disposal industry in the United States is a $75 billion comprised of about 20,000 companies (Waste Age). The centralization, however, is huge; the top three company’s control 25% of the industry. These companies are all experts at making it look like the problem of waste (spurred of course by planned obsolescence) doesn’t exist. They have helped bring about this “new economic regime [which has] created and demanded unprecedented levels of consumption, the main by-product of which [is] garbage" (Sala). This not only reduces our ability to comprehend the impact we are creating, but disrupts our capability of using alternative methods such as recycling (Refsgaard). To aid in the removal of our thoughts from this awful truth, they distribute green trashcans for their green dump trucks to pick up, while whisking away all of our trash with a smile and a wave. What we don’t, see, however, are the trucks driving to the massive landfills to dump out all of our waste.

All of this “hiding” of the actual effects of our own pollution, which in the United States averages 4.5 lbs of trash per person per day (Waste Age), props up our entire waste based economy. It has direct ties to advertising, whose entire industry is based upon the concept of continued, unnecessary consumption, by allowing us to follow their orders without seeing the damage it’s creating for our own personal lives (Wagner) and our environment. On the production side of thing, it allows for the creation of these millions of objects, all of which are built to include planned obsolescence, which the advertisers are selling. The majority of these products, in turn, are being manufactured by the roughly 23.6 million sweatshop workers around the world, 80% of which aren’t being protected by the anti-sweatshop laws set in place by their governments which the companies are supposed to uphold (Joel).

This brings us full circle: All of this trash has to go somewhere. Because this trash is rife with harmful chemicals and other materials, the landfills and other facilities this trash is placed into have been known to cause health risks to those living nearby. In Mexico, for instance, those living near a recycling plant were found to have “elevated risks of health defects” including birth defects and heart disease (Ahumada). This brings up the question of who decides where to put this trash and these trash facilities. The industry itself doesn’t care; instead they base where they put the trash on who is willing to take subsidies. The northern suburbs of Philadelphia, for instance, get sent about 2,500 tons of trash per day from New York City. In 2007 Waste Management paid $17.4 million in “host fees” to a variety of counties in eastern Pennsylvania for gathering additional trash from NYC as well (Fernandez). These Pennsylvanians have it better off, believe it or not: despite the fact they are being exploited because of their economic status, they are at least getting paid. Those Mexicans, on the other hand, weren’t paid a dime despite the fact that it was causing documented illness. This whole process of the rich paying to keep the trash as far away as possible, of course, is lining the pockets of the waste management industry.

On one hand, our economy is set up in such a fashion that without a waste management industry, our backyards would be filled to the brim with trash. On the other hand, however, our back yards being filled with trash (and the health risks it brings) would definitely open our eyes up to the amount of environmental and social damage our system is creating. =Works Cited= 1 June 2005. __Waste Age.__ 26 10 2010 . Ahumada, Horacio Tovalin. "Health condition in a population living near an industrial waste recyling plant in Mexico." __Rev Panam Salud Publica__ (1998): vol. 3, pp 152-157. Fernandez, Manny. "Philadephians Reap Rewards from New York's Trash." 1 November 2009. __The New York Times.__ 26 10 2010 . Joel, Patrick. "Sweat Shops." __WorldHealer.__ 26 10 2010 . Press, James. __International Directory of Company Histories.__ 1992. Refsgaard, K Maggnusen and K. ""Household Behaviour and Attitudes with respect to Recycling Food Waste- Experiences from Focus Group." __Journal of Environmental Management__ (2009): 90(2), 760. Sala, S. ""Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage"." __The Journal of Environmental Education__ (2007): 60-61. Wagner, Sean. "Feelings of Self-Worth Impacted by Advertisements." 26 Oct 2006. __EurekAlert!__ 26 10 2010 .