I wonder why people litter in the USA?

This. Throwing your trash on the ground because you can't find a trash can amounts to childish entitlement in my eyes.

No trash cans in the forest, is OP saying they just litter all through nature when they go camping?

With respect to Japan, there's definitely a culture difference, but I don't think it's the consumerism/waste culture. There's so much excess packaging in Japanese food products.

In fairness, I remember a time when everyone smoked in Japan and flicked cigarette butts all over the place.

Plenty of consumerism and waste in Japan. For trash, it's socially acceptable to ask a store to use their trash can.

It's another true half statement the middle management refuses to complete. "Nobody wants to work anymore for the wages offered for these types of jobs". Same old story as middle management accepting "the customer is always right" (and entitling shitty customers) without finishing it with "in terms of market trends"

Don't worry, you'll soon get massive tax cuts for companies and their executives, while basic goods get 25%-35% pricier for the worker class due to the tariffs since the orange potato has to fun those tax cuts somehow.

"I couldn't find a single vacant public toilet, so I did what any sensible person would do and took a shit in the middle of the sidewalk." —OP, analogously

Especially in the US where people drive everywhere more often than not. Keep a small trash bag in your car, empty it when you get home.

OP didn't say he littered. But of course we always assume the worst around here.

Yeah! Fuck you OP!

I've had plenty of times where I get home and empty my pockets of the trash I accumulated with no can nearby.

And if I try to put something in a can and it falls out, I'm taking it with me because I didn't succeed in throwing it away.

Shrugging ans saying "well I tried" as you walk away isn't even trying.

Japanese people do that as trash bins are very rare. It is an education issue and not the lack/full of trash binsy

Same. And sometimes if it's convenient, I'll keep my recyclables like paper, cans, and glass until I have access to a sink to clean then (glass, maybe cans) and can toss them in my recycling system at home.

Fyi, make sure your recyclables are dry before dropping them off/having them picked up

I would pull the top of all of these (without breaking it) and make all the trash fit, or, if absolutely required, carry it as you say

You're a rare breed

otoh if you're lazy and not the best person, and if it's too much of a hassle to carry around…

You don't even know how fast these damn bins fill up. I'm a janitor at McDonald's, and move between 5 locations (same franchise owner). The two that are in a highway rest stop kind of area that get the most customers have several cans around the parking lot. I empty them before the restaurant even opens, and all or most of them are already full by my first break. There's only ever 1 janitor on shift at a time and we can't be everywhere all the time. Something I have had to explain to the owner who constantly gets on my ass about the cans in the parking lot being full. "Do you want me to just spend all day making sure the garbage cans are empty or shall I do the other tasks I have as well?"

The bins themselves look pretty large with the huge stone enclosure they're in; but the actual can inside is not even as big as a standard home kitchen bin, and the amount of trash generated by a single to-go meal from the restaurant is pretty nuts. And this is just from a fast food place. The bins placed by the city or municipality probably have even less of a chance to be serviced when the employees who do that are also in charge of cleaning the park bathrooms, mowing the grass, trimming trees and shrubs, fixing road signs, etc.

Eh, It's a bit of both. No amount of societal pressure will solve a complete absence of waste disposal infrastructure. It's a matter of making sure the sense of shame and/or duty is greater than whatever distance there inevitably is to a working bin.

reduce, reuse, recycle.

That shit is in order of most impactful.

I buy as much as I can second hand. Doing so, I am not bombarded with trash. No boxes, no bags, no plastic wrap.

We should 100% just not be producing all this trash. Coffee at home has zero waste, no plastic cup, no receipt, no carrier, no lid,...... do that shit everyday x millions of people. smh

Don't garbage men have surprisingly handsome pay? Or is that just an urban legend I've fallen for?

Yeah, OP is complaining to the internet when they should be bugging town council. Although they seem to think it's just low-wage workers messing with them personally...

I worked for a park for a summer and it was an eye opener I'll tell you that much. They had someone (me!) basically just emptying trash cans all damn day and it wasn't enough! They filled up constantly.

The to-go and eating while mobile are a big chunk of litter.

A Dunks went in about a mile from a place I used to live, and where we lived was sort of a shortcut to one of the main roads from where the Dunks went in.

Our road began to be littered with Dunkin’ plastic cups, coffee cups and to-go bags. People would finish items and toss the trash out the window.

So taking things to-go and just throwing the trash down wherever is a big contributor.

Your point is valid (as I read it "if you have less trash there will be less trash") but the path you used to get there is illogical (as I read it "if I have less trash, but people empty the trash at the same rate, this would not be a problem").

OPs complaint is not that trash produced exceeds our capacity to remove it, it's that people are not removing it. This remains true regardless of quantity.

Yup, same logic with traffic / transportation. So much money wasted on roads instead of regulations that stimulate mixed use neighborhoods, which would reduce the need for moving around and solve the issue at the root.

I forgot what event it was here in Germany (where there are plenty of trash cans, at least in the inner cities) but every group of Japanese tourists left places they visit cleaner than they found them. They were nice

In the US we teach kids that trash men are suckers and idiots that didn't work hard enough in school! Also, that trash is an externality: Someone else's problem.

"We pay taxes for people to clean that up! Why should I spend my valuable time doing someone else's job‽"

It's an awful culture.

I worked at dunkin while I was in college and it didn't matter how often you took the trash out during the summertime, it was constantly overflowing from people cleaning out their cars into it.

Not even kidding, one day I was on break outside and watched someone fill the freshly emptied can 3/4 full with all their fast food trash. As soon as the trashcan is empty people take the opportunity to clean out their cars. It's fucking weird.

All you need is a can return policy and some homeless.

You keep your not quite empty styrofoam coffee cup in you pocket? Don't you get sticky and start to smell like overripe coffee beans?

Partially agree, people are weirdly reluctant to ask for things to be fixed. I mean who among us has not just decided to skip out on telling the random employee that the bathroom is about out of soap? But how would they know?

The answer of course is that businesses which generate tons of onsite waste and provide trash bins have people whose job it is to keep an eye on cleanliness which includes soap, trash, etc. on a regular basis. Much the same way when you go to a grocery store you're never out of carts. The difference is people use carts to buy, while garbage is different, so companies optimize for what makes them money at the cost of public good.

Unless you want hepatitis C, that's probably not the best idea. Nothing short of medieval plate armor would eliminate the risk of accidentally stabbing yourself on something.

Garbage is very expensive that's why you want to build a society that doesn't create unnecessary garbage