ends up in the dumpster.

not far off the mark.

An industry exists now that did not exist before so that means jobs were created.

Is that industry doing more for the economy or for the environment?

Does it matter as long as it's doing good?

We have recycled in our town for many years and I hope it's doing some good.

That said, I have long heard various issues with recycling, ranging from the cost effectiveness (which I'll admit I can look past for a good cause) but also things like: What about the additional pollution created for all the extra trucks for recycling pick up, the energy needed to run all the physical processes, the not so good by product that comes from the process of recycling paper, and that large quantities of our recyclables wind up in the exact same dump as our garbage anyway. That's a literal fact and not opinion. 

There's some even deeper issues to ponder: Does it encourage even more consumption?   http://www.forbes.com/sites/amywestervelt/2012/04/25/can-recycling-be-bad-for-the-environment/" rel="nofollow - http://www.forbes.com/sites/amywestervelt/2012/04/25/can-recycling-be-bad-for-the-environment/  This Forbes article discusses it, among other things, and it's something that has long made me think. 

EDIT: Landfills aren't dumps by the way, many may think it's a pit we throw stuff in. It is sealed, layered, allows rain drainage (so that it just doesn't fill up with stagnant water) some actually are powered by the gas produced from the landfill and when filled you cover it up with grass so it need not be a festering pit. 

Just like how we shouldn't scrap recycling, I'm not saying we should use only landfills, but it's a lot to ponder if you are sincere and not just blindly following.    

Hopefully some team of smart people can take a deep look into some of the above issues and figure out the best way to go forward. 

Can't force this upon the many, (especially since modern society loooooooooves spending and wasting ) but it's what I can do, and that's ideally the best solution for most things: every person doing what they can. 

Yeah, we should take a sincere look into it all, especially since the truly best environmental solutions are not very popular. No one wants to be told what to do...so we can't limit consumption, and many middle class progressives sure love their big ass houses (I can attest personally, having grown up in one of the foamiest parts of the housing bubble) Which btw, the McMansions have been sprouting up again.

I'd love nothing more than to live in a small place, fairly minimally, and using what I do have till I can't and generally being smart about usage. 

the more money they spend the better it is for the economy. 

They buy more than they need more often than they need to and all that consumption creates

a lot of waste. 

You are wrong. By a huge margin in fact. It takes 20 time more power to convert bauxite into aluminium than it does to recycle, the equipment is 10 times more expensive and it produces over 30 times more greenhouse gases. 

 

It's going to take a hell of a lot of spin to make those figures look bad for recycling.

It's a specious article on several levels in my estimation. Statements like: "Worst of all is yard waste: it takes 20 tons of it to save a single ton of carbon dioxide." and "...the total annual savings in the United States from recycling everything else ... is only two-tenths of 1 percent of America’s carbon footprint." are presented like they are a bad-thing... duh, no: every ton of carbon that is not released into the atmosphere is a win. You save 1 ton of carbon dioxide, get 11 tons of usable (saleable) compost & mulch, and 20 tons of organic waste doesn't go into landfill. When recycling yard waste the material undergoes aerobic decomposition and releases CO2, in landfill it undergoes anaerobic decomposition and releases CH4 (methane). Also 0.2% of America's carbon footprint is equivalent to the carbon footprint of Luxembourg.