Abstract
The initial enthusiasm for increased recycling activity has been, to some extent, tempered by a growing realization amongst those studying the problem that in most industrialized economies a highly competitive private reclamation industry has already been developed. The combined activities of this reclamation industry and a wide variety of municipal and charity group recycling ventures have served to push recycling rates up to fairly high levels, but still not enough compared with the technological potentiality of recycling rates. An accounting framework for recycling schemes is analyzed from a social cost best analysis point of view. The potenial for secondary materials and the economic viability of recycling schemes are not uniform and much will depend on, among other factors, to what extent the external cost of environmental damage is internalized and relative prices of the secondary and primary materials.
