June 30,1976
Page 21411
ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS SUBMITTED
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, my support today for the Hatfield amendment to place a 5-cent return value on all beverage containers comes only after careful examination of the issues involved. The voters in Maine will be addressing this issue as an item on the ballot in the November election.
My support is the result of the belief that we must adopt policies to reverse habits that waste rather than preserve resources — whether those resources are air, water, land, energy, or minerals.
The Nation's use of nonreturnable beverage containers has skyrocketed and is the fastest growing component of municipal waste. One-way cans and bottles use three times the energy of refillable containers. If the Hatfield amendment became law, the Nation would save over half the amount of oil saved by adopting the 55-mile-per-hour speed limit on our highways.
Oregon's law provides the only extensive test of this policy to date. Well over half of their highway litter was beverage containers. The best studies indicate that a substantial reduction — from 50 to 80 percent — has occurred in roadside litter, due to less use of non-refillable containers and the incentive to earn money by collecting deposits for such litter.
On of the most troublesome questions is the impact on jobs of such a policy. The most "neutral study" available, conducted by the Research Triangle Institute, estimates that this legislation would create 107,900 jobs while eliminating 39,000 jobs — a plus for total employment. The 5-year delay in implementing this policy contained in the amendment would ease this transition. In addition, it must be remembered that continuation of the growth in one-way containers will also eliminate jobs due to the centralization and mass marketing that occurs. As an example, Coca Cola plans to close 900 franchised bottling plants across the country and create 78 centralized sites by 1980 — a trend that has been occurring for the past 10 years and eliminates jobs.
It is doubtful that this amendment would create all the benefits claimed by some of its supporters or create the harm alleged by its opponents. But it is a needed step to assist in developing a "conservation ethic" that rejects waste and embraces thrift, husbandry, and saving part of the Earth's abundance for our posterity.