The backlash from the Raleigh ban on garbage disposals has the rest of the state chuckling. But it’s not funny for the residents who are ready to turn these council members out on their ears. While the garbage disposal presents a difficult question on the philosophical issues of individual rights versus the public good – as the disposal represents the interface between private and public spheres – it’s one of those problems (clogging) that Raleigh would have done better to figure out without government intrusion.
What I find most interesting about this is that when state and local governments find ways to stick it to the public by indirect means (impact fees, excessive industry regs, subsidies, corporate giveaways) the public largely yawns because the media do a poor job of communicating the costs to individual families, and people, well, are just more likely to think "you can tax me, but don’t mess with my garbage disposal." Ah, democracy. In any case, the public is "rationally ignorant" about the negative unintended consequences of what the government gets away with on a daily basis, but I can’t give the media a pass. It’s their job.
-Max Borders
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