Ecology, the environment and cash register receipts – a strange but important trio, demonstrating yet again how insane things are.
I get a scone. I wanted blueberry but settled for cranberry. (Is that important? No. But I wanted to set the scene.) It cost $3.03 with tax.
First of all, why are we still using pennies? Just make the scone three bucks.
Second, I was given a receipt. (You can see the ACTUAL receipt below.) For each of the countless number of little purchases I’ve made previous to this one, I instinctively threw out the useless piece of paper. This time I decided to keep it for the purposes of sharing with you.
How does this make any sense? This receipt is not helping my tax return preparation and I’m not going to return a scone! Billions of receipts like this are printed every year and promptly thrown in the trash. So much so that they overflow the garbage cans at Dunkin Donuts and ATM vestibules. Walk around the streets of New York and the sidewalks are littered with $1.59 coffee receipts and $20 cash withdrawal receipts.
At the same time, we’re losing our forests at an alarming rate. The forests which filter the air we breathe.
In order to feed our “lifestyle improvements” we are logging forests like crazy, including to constantly build housing developments. Trees are being gutted by an infestation of new insects, eating through 40 million trees like they were mozzarella sticks. And, of course, trees are losing their lives so we can verify that we bought a scone.
Entire countries are going electronic and eliminating the need for coins and receipts. There are innovators like those at BitCoin envisioning a new monetary landscape.
We have to adapt. We cannot continue with these antiquated ways of living. It has to stop and stop immediately.
Petition your local retailer. Make the case. The trees will thank you.
Founder, Areena
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