Comment by irishcoffee
2 hours ago
The engine block in an old car blew up so I ripped it completely apart and sold the parts online and in person to various people. I tried to sell my own catalytic converter to a shop I found online that was some kind of on-the-up-and-up licensed buyer.
What I didn’t know is they wouldn’t buy it from me if I wasn’t a licensed seller. I was irritated but realized it probably was for the best. And it worked, I still have it sitting in my shed.
I don’t know how to make that reality happen with copper, which is clearly much more abundant than cat converters are, but I imagine you could at least do something like what happens when you buy a pseudoephedrine product, they scan your ID and track the frequency of your purchases. Too much too quick and you’re on a short list.
I don’t see a feasiae way to invert that, selling copper requires an ID and infrastructure for maintaining a database of sellers, amount, and frequency, but I imagine if you started at the top and worked your way down it could become a regulated commodity to sell… somehow.
Some states (Alabama, for instance, as I'm told by a contractor business operator friend who lives in it), requires you to either have a receipt from a licensed contractor who replaced whatever you're scrapping, or a business license to sell scrap copper.
I'm not wedded to any particular solution that will stop tweakers from getting cash from scrap yards no questions asked. Any mixture of them will work.
FWIW, I've asked him if the state mandating a 30 day delay on payments, or banning cash transactions for it would affect him any. His answer was 'not at all'.