Recycling is a long-practiced, productive, indeed essential, element of the market system. Informed, voluntary recycling conserves resources and raises our wealth, enabling us to achieve valued ends that would otherwise be impossible. So yes, people do recycle even when they are not forced to do so. However, forcing people to recycle makes society worse off. Mandated recycling exists mainly because there is plenty of money to be made by labeling products as "green" or "recycled" to get municipal and federal grants. Henry Hazlitt and Ludwig von Mises speak to our recycling topic. In Economics in One Lesson, Hazlitt teaches us that mandatory recycling considers only-short term benefits to a few groups — politicians, public-relations consultants, environmental organizations, and waste-handling corporations — instead of looking at the longer-term effects of the policy for all groups. The negative consequence will be the squandering of human resources.

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