Like dandelions in spring time, state and city laws that regulate recycling of electronic waste such as printers and monitors continue to profligate throughout the country, placing a real and tremendous burden on manufacturers, especially smaller ones. This morning's Wall Street Journal has an article about the latest of these efforts, particularly in Washington state and New York City. According to the article, the Washington state recycling fee applies even to manufacturers who go out of business or stop selling their products in the state, while New York City's ordinance, which goes into effect July 31, is estimated to cost the industry $200 million a year. It's the first ordinance that goes beyond manufacturers paying a recycling fee. Companies will also be required to provide free, door-to-door pickup of electronic waste.

Depending on your perspective, these laws might range from annoying to onerous. From a legal perspective, though, it may be hard to challenge them. While it may seem unfair to continue charging companies a recycling fee even if they've stopped doing business in that state, the state's argument is that the company did business in the past, (presumably) profited from that business, and therefore the state can require the company to pay for recycling costs. The New York city ordinance seems even more solid -- local jurisdictions have broad latitude to impose taxes on a wide variety of businesses (have you checked out your motel or hotel bill recently?) without judicial intervention, and they do it all the time. If you don't like it, you can pull out of that jurisdiction (as Amazon has done recently, by canceling its affiliate program in certain states to avoid collecting sales tax). The only thing states have to be careful about is running afoul of the interstate commerce clause -- their recycling laws can't impose an "undue burden" on interstate commerce. It's a tough standard to meet, and I don't see anything in these laws that would meet it.

The solution? A federal law that covers e-waste recycling, as cumbersome as it might seem, would probably go a long way towards killing local and state efforts. Having one standard to deal with is nearly always preferable. In the absence of federal legislation, these local ordinances will continue to pass. Just like those pesky dandelions.