The Washington Post has an article on the decline of garbage (the Post itself is in decline--it announces it's doing away with its separate business section) because people are cutting back in the recession. A sidebar, not online, says the U.S. had 250 million tons of garbage, 12 percent of which was food, or 30 million tons. That means about 100 pounds per person per year. Sounds high, although I suspect it includes stuff like my grapefruit rinds, apple cores, and coffee grounds. But it's also my share of the fruits and vegetables which get rejected at the grocery.
Apparently most of the drop is in packaging, which is the single most common category of garbage--we're buying less so tossing less styrofoam and cardboard.
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