When I was in fifth grade, my grandpa took me to the school trash can. “Do you know those Coca-Cola and water bottles that people throw away?” he asked me in Mandarin. I nodded and spotted two empty bottles of Poland Spring lying on a nearby pile of trash. He quickly pulled them out and put them in a plastic bag. “That’s 10 cents. Your turn,” he said with a smile as I ran to another trash can. A few seconds later, I was victorious and held the Pepsi can above my head like it was a trophy.
My grandfather was a canner who collected recyclable containers from the streets and turned them into money. In New York state, canning is made possible by the Returnable Container Act passed in 1982, which requires a 5-cent deposit on glass, metal, and plastic beverage containers. The law was intended to reduce trash and encourage recycling, but it also provided a lifeline to some New Yorkers. A new bill pending in the state Legislature offers a chance to significantly improve the welfare of canners like our grandfathers.
There are an estimated 4,000 to 8,000 canneries in New York City. Many of them rely on canned food because they are unable to earn a steady income for various reasons. Because they are homeless, unemployed, or recently immigrated like my grandfather.
Canned foods are often seen as sad and degrading. When I was in her fifth grade, I remember seeing the looks of disgust and bewilderment on the faces of my classmates when I told them that picking up trash was actually quite lucrative. I quickly learned not to express opinions like this. Nevertheless, I was raised to respect my family, especially my elders, so I was never embarrassed by the fact that my grandfather was a canner.
But on the streets of New York, my grandfather endured harsh scrutiny. And some in his family looked down on him, saying he did dirty and dirty work.
However, there is a difference between being hopeless and being pathetic. Although no one chooses it as their first choice as a career, canning provided my grandfather with the opportunity to build a life and a family. He always took pride in his work.
When my grandparents immigrated to the United States from China, their lack of English prevented them from doing most jobs, and they had to rely on the meager money they could earn through odd jobs and eventually side jobs. Some people collect cans to supplement their savings and feed their families. I remember my grandfather spending hours every day picking up bottles just to make enough money for his family to go to bed with a full stomach.
His first priority was to help his father attend college without taking out loans. he was able to accomplish that. After getting a job in construction, my grandfather continued to work as a way to help make ends meet for his 30 years until the pandemic began.
Since the returnable container law was enacted 40 years ago, the benefits of canned food have continued to decline. A nickel is worth only one-third of what it was in 1982 today. You have to collect 100 containers to earn just $5, which is barely enough to eat. That’s 100 repetitions of finding and collecting everything you’ve collected, not to mention carrying it around and finding redemption centers. Additionally, many stores have limits on the number and type of containers that can be redeemed, requiring canners to travel to multiple locations to unload.
The new bill would double the bottle deposit from 5 cents to 10 cents and expand the types of containers that can be redeemed. For many canners, higher profits mean less time on the streets and more time for education, family, and working to earn a more stable income.
As my grandfather regularly pointed out, canning is no easy task. He often took me with him to help carry and redeem the containers we collected. As a teenager, I had little difficulty walking the 800m route, choosing recyclable items, but my grandfather was in his 70s, so he had to stop and rest periodically. “You’re lucky,” he would say to me. “When you get to my age, everything becomes 10 times more difficult.”
Increasing the deposit in the container will also most likely be beneficial to recycling. In 2020, New York recycled 5.5 billion containers, with a recovery rate of 64%. Part of that is thanks to the long hours the canner spends packing after others, a percentage that reached 70% of his in 2022. Still, these rates can improve, as evidenced by reimbursement rates of 76 percent in Michigan and 86 percent in Oregon. In both states, container redemption is 10 cents. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that states with the highest redemption rates also tend to have the highest deposit amounts.
The benefits of doubling your bottle deposit are clear. It’s time to give canners the respect they deserve.