[hilbert42]

"So instead of destroying those clothes in Europe, we'll just add an unnecessary shipping step to the process, producing tons of unnecessary CO2."

The world being as it is you're likely correct and your cynicism makes sense, but I'd like to think somehow you're wrong.

That EU regulators actually saw need for such regulations makes me both sad and annoyed because they ought not be necessary. What's wrong with clothing manufacture, commerce and trade, and fashion that brand-new clothing can be just trashed and destroyed? Right, we know it's a rhetorical question but we must continue to ask it.

What's happening is sheer madness! If aliens were to witness this from a holistic perspective they'd arrive at conclusion the inhabitants of this planet are de-arranged. Why would any species take effort to gather resources/grow raw materials such as resource-hungry cotton then take time and more effort to manufacture it into useful products then move it holus-bolus to another part of the planet only to discard and destroy it unused—and harm the planet’s ecological systems in the process? That is unless they’re mad.

In a nutshell, why not do something more useful and productive and less wasteful?

What upsets me so much about this unnecessary waste is that when I was a kid clothes were expensive, my parents struggled to send us to school neat, tidy and well-dressed. When I ripped holes in the knees of my grey school pants through rough play rather than buy new ones necessity meant my mother would spend hours at the sewing machine mending them.

What’s happening with these clothes is unnecessary waste and vandalism on a grand scale, and the fashion industry along with unethical marketing practices are largely responsible. People not only have too much disposable income but ‘fashion’ has convinced them their clothes are out of fashion almost from the moment they’ve bought them, these days, the notion of actually wearing one’s clothes until they’re worn out is almost inconceivable.

Little wonder megatons of discarded barely-used and new clothes are polluting the planet.

[Nevermark]

> What upsets me so much about this unnecessary waste

To the degree ethics (which I am using here to mean, accounting for negative externalities) are not incorporated into economics, with very few exceptions, every company will optimize their profits with no thought to externalities.

Shareholders might care about waste as individuals, but are not coordinated in anyway that moves corporations. And any corporations that would like to be more ethical still have to compete with those that are not. Some with large margins can do that, but most cannot.

Asking/convincing companies or individuals to be voluntarily ethical, one at a time, is not a solution. It is asking the wiser people to de-power themselves, in a way that just increases the opportunity, profits and incentives for less-altruistic actors.

What the EU is doing is good. But I would like to see a consistent economic governance effort to avoid all significant negative externalities. Both the environment and the economy's value creation and net wealth, are better off without colossal destruction of value happening off the books.

Dealing with each externality as if it were an isolated problem fritters away resources and time, and throws away the clarity and commonality that would allow consistent reforms to happen. We don't have that time to waste.

[hilbert42]

"Asking/convincing companies or individuals to be voluntarily ethical, one at a time, is not a solution. ...just increases the opportunity, profits and incentives for less-altruistic actors."

Exactly, it's why we need to reintroduce regulations many of which were removed or weakened from the late 1970s onward. Moreover, we need intelligent regulation not just gut reaction to an immediate problem. That's proving much more difficult (reigning in the excesses of laissez-faire capitalism that were let out of the bag ~50 years ago with deregulation won't be easy).

[randomtoast]

"So instead of destroying those clothes in Europe, we'll just add an unnecessary shipping step to the process, producing tons of unnecessary CO2."

> The world being as it is you're likely correct and your cynicism makes sense, but I'd like to think somehow you're wrong.

I don't see any cynicism here, only pure realism. The real question is why EU law tries to create a utopia on paper while ignoring real-world situations. That's what has always frustrated people in the EU about the institution: its lack of decisions that are close to the people and grounded in reality. Yes of course, everyone gets the idea and the good intentions behind it, but good intentions alone are not worth the paper that they are written on.

[tonoto]

For quite many years I saw EU as something mostly good. Since ten years back I'm hesitating. Enforcements when it comes to cars (like the (EU) 2018/858) where the manufacturers are forced to implement "safety" features that customers don't want/need and "environmental" features (such as AD blue) that makes worse products. Regulations that perhaps were good on paper, but that will backlash on manufacturers and consumers (as the cars since then became way more expensive).

Regulations on sorting out textile (such as worn underwear, textile diapers) created huge issues in Sweden to take care of the textile waste to a big surprise for the politicians..

I believe we (the citizens of EU) deserve better

[fireflash38]

I see this response as the exact same one about tax cheating and how the rich will just move away or be better at cheating taxes.

Did we forget how to discover and punish bad actors? Do you think we should just do nothing and let casual bad behavior go because some people are gonna be abusive? No. I refuse to accept that. It is not your false dichotomy.

If people abuse the system, fine and punish them. More than they profit off of the bad actions.

[etiennebausson]

That extra step mean selling what remains at low cost might be more financially interesting than if they could destroy it 'on site'. Not a perfect solution, but it push the incentives in the right direction.

[vrighter]

In fact, there is precedent for this kind of thing too.

Plastic used to be shipped to china and burned there, until china decided to stop accepting everyone else's trash

[red-iron-pine]

bad guys do bad things and will try to get around these laws.... so we shouldn't have laws and should just let bad guys be bad.

[yason]

What's wrong with clothing manufacture, commerce and trade, and fashion that brand-new clothing can be just trashed and destroyed?

The industrial process (and, to add, global economy relying on slave-cheap labour in a far enough country) has become effective enough that it literally costs less to make surplus items than to scrap them. Not exactly the level of cost in duplicating copyrighted bits but low enough that the sales effort to find buyers for the clothes after the season is more expensive than the profits from it. Often the price of items doesn't even warrant paying for returns: many online shops just tell you to keep the product if you claim a defective product and want your money back.

But you can't entirely blame the clothing markets alone: when it comes to cheap items any reasonable business would source a bit extra in the hopes of selling more. If you source fewer items than what will sell you'll be losing money. Given the profit margins it makes sense to just source X percent extra and calculate that it's cheaper to pay for them but not sell, rather than pay for too few and limit your profits by running out of stock. It's like insuring yourself by taking a slice of your profits today to prevent a rainy day from happening.

Us consumers of the modern commercial wonders are not without guilt either. We support this by buying new, crap quality garments that last only so long we'll soon be buying more. The price is low but the value is even lower, and that's the profit of the clothing industry. Buying new again and again is what enables the industry to operate. You can still have your clothes handmade by a tailor with lasting quality and for prices astronomical enough that you'll surely won't be (nor afford to) throwing them out too soon. Few people choose to do that, of course.

The exact same thing is happening on varying scales in: consumer electronics, appliances, cars, houses...

[hilbert42]

"...it literally costs less to make surplus items than to scrap them."

Right, my rhetorical point somewhat expanded here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47031527

"But you can't entirely blame the clothing markets..."

Nor stupid consumers, but watering down blame will weaken resolve to fix the problem. Perhaps it should become fashionable to criticize those who buy too many clothes by asking "do you really need that item?". Criticizing and ostracizing works, it greatly reduced cigarette smoking.

[whywhywhywhy]

> but I'd like to think somehow you're wrong.

It’s what already happens with recycling in Europe, it’s resold several times to companies claiming to recycle it and ends up shipped to the poor parts of South East Asia and burned or dumped.

[gzread]

Is Europe punishing these companies when they get discovered?

[boxed]

> What upsets me so much about this unnecessary waste is that when I was a kid clothes were expensive

Clothes used to be more expensive and that makes you upset now?

But go back before the mechanized loom to see ACTUAL expensive clothing. When people were robbed, they literally took their clothes. People were murdered for the clothes they wore.

Now let's rethink this. Should you be angry that you didn't get beaten for destroying your clothing when you were a kid, because actually clothing was insanely cheap compared to pre-industrial ages? No, we should know our history and be glad that things are cheaper now.

[MonkeyClub]

> Why would any species take effort to [...]

Because Market Forces said so :(

[blitzar]

Its the invisible hand of harvard MBAs at work.

[gosub100]

Why not regulate thrift stores and force them to have 40% of their inventory at fixed prices? $3 for shirts and $7 for pants/shorts? Part of the problem, at least in the US, is that thrift stores are filled to capacity. But just like everywhere else, their prices are high as well. If we want to interfere with a free market, why not start there, to force higher turnover and keep them from rejecting donations?

[xyzzyz]

They’d be filled to capacity even if they literally gave everything for free, because the unsold stuff is mostly the kind of things that people don’t want in the first place. The good stuff would be snatched, and the things nobody wants would linger there forever.

[anovikov]

The only thing that can objectively reduce waste is well, simplifying access to people's data/surveillance capitalism. This way corps will have a better idea of what people want to wear and at which price they are willing to buy it, and products will be wasted less. They are making the best decisions based on available information. No one trashes products for fun.