Stuck with plastic bags

By Amy Chai
Ellicott City

Regarding the March 17 editorial “Bag-tax anxiety” and the March 21 letter “Better to ban than to tax the bags”:

The culture of the grocery stores needs to change. I have long fought with the checkout workers to simply leave my purchases alone so that I can put them back into the cart without any bags. They seem incapable of understanding my meaning, and then they proceed to double-bag that gallon of milk.

At Safeway recently, the cashier demanded to put “paid” stickers on each and every grocery item that I purchased if I did not want bags. About halfway through the ordeal, I said, “Just put them in bags.” She smiled and got back to bagging my groceries.

Why do they have to make it impossible to do the right thing?