Even though I like the idea of reducing crime in the scrap industry, I have never liked the thought of imposing additional regulations on an industry. I’m not sure that simply taking away one method of thievery after another will ever solve the problem. Instead of finding every possible thing a person could steal and trying to make it more difficult to do, why don’t lawmakers look more into how we can stop people from becoming thieves in the first place. It’s kind of like that old saying about teaching a man to fish, feed him for a lifetime, only in reverse. Take away a person’s ability to steal one thing, he/she will just find another thing to steal. Keep someone from becoming a thief and stop a lifetime of crime.

This just doesn’t seem right, especially in this time of financial crisis. Recyclers are already hurting with the depressed prices of recyclables and now some of their money has to go to other private companies administering a federal program? Where’s the stimilus in that?

Have you ever wondered what happens to a junk vehicle when it is no longer of any use? This blog article describes it pretty well and includes a video of a small shredder. A larger shredder will do the same thing in about 1/4 the time.

Recently, I posted this about metals theft legislation, in large part because ISRI (Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries) brought up the subject and asked members to get involved in writing letters to try to get the legislation changed. A comment by RecycleBill made me start to think more carefully. Soon after that, I read this article. So, maybe I have allowed myself to be led about too easily without considering the full issue. So, I have made a resolution to make sure I take a closer look.

So, just after I made that resolution, I received word about this article. I’ll stick with my resolution but I do have something to say about this bill. What in the world were they smoking?! Catalytic converters are an important part of the scrap stream and now what, are they supposed to just leave them on the cars and have them ground up at the shredder, wasting one of the most valuable scrap commodities? And what if you replace an air conditioner? It has to go to the landfill? Or it gets put in the tin pile and gets shredded? Stupid, stupid, stupid.

While I’m not in favor of giving everybody a handout as part of a stimulus package, it seems the Germans have come up with a deal that is having a pretty immediate impact on their economy. Perhaps the US government should have thought of something like this instead of just handing automakers huge bailout checks.