Sub-title to this book I am reading is “Travels in the billion dollar trash trade” The book is the first book written by Adam Minter. Mr. Minter grew up in Minneapolis, MN in a family scrap business. His story details how the scrap industry evolved from a bunch of peddlers to a multibillion dollar industry today. He traveled all over the world tracing scrap or junk from how it didn’t end up in a landfill but landed in a scrap yard, got sorted and bundled with like material, shipped to a processor and came out as a new product.
The greatest insight he provides is the interplay between manufacturing, recycling and the influence China has on the scrap industry and prices of almost everything in the world. Fascinating insight into the our world wide economy, not just the scrap industry.