It's in the Bag? The Effect of Plastic Carryout Bag Bans on Where and What People Purchase to Eat

Abstract

The linkages between food convenience, health, and the environment are complex and policies that aim to address one arm of the linkage may have unintended consequences on the others. In this paper, I examine how a policy designed to benefit the environment also influences where and what people purchase to eat. Specifically, I examine how the banning of plastic carryout bags affects both where people purchase food and the types of food they purchase. Using quasi-random variation in bag ban adoption in California, I find that bag bans cause a persistent 1.8% decline in food-at-home sales and a 3.7% increase in food-away-from-home sales. The decline in food-at-home sales is driven by a drop in frozen and dry grocery purchases -- items that are storable, making them unnecessary to purchase every shopping trip. Heterogeneity analyses reveal the policy effects are strongest for those with higher incomes, those under 65 years, and those with young children, suggesting both income effects and time constraints as mechanisms behind the behavioral change. Given food-away-from-home tends to be higher in energy-density, fat, and sodium than food-at-home, these shifts in food purchases are important for policymakers to consider when designing environmental policies that affect the convenience of food shopping.