Generally, environmentalists go to extremes every time.
Looking at the article you linked to, they're estimating anywhere from 142 million to 500 million straws are used every day. What they fail to mention is that there are only about 326 million people in the US. That would make that everyone in this country uses up to 1.5 straws every day. In the environmentalist's mind every one of those straws is apparently ending up in the ocean.
Now, according to a study done by Northeastern University, the US is #20 on the overall ocean polluter list at 1.4% whereas the top 5 polluters - China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Sri Lanka - account for about 60%.
Please let me know how banning straws and charging me $0.10 per plastic grocery bag in California is going to help the overall picture of ocean pollution when the US as a whole when we're barely a blip in the overall statistics.
The answer is that it isn't. Like you said, it's only to make a small but vocal group feel good and also gives another turn of the screws to the people from a government that loves to tell people what they can and can't do.
Finally, the funny part about the $0.10 bag fee... Originally, the legislation was supposed to have the funds go to environmental groups but the Grocery Industry snuck in and convinced the public that the ban was good but the fee should stay with the stores so they can buy the new plastic bags and pass the cost on to them... Capitalism taking advantage of socialism.
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