In practice, it varies between jurisdictions who is ultimately responsible for the deposit. Regardless, it’s a policy that works really well for bottles and cans. It should be applied to other types of containers and packaging.

This article makes a strong case for using reusable, ceramic plates instead of disposable paper ones. The article treats clean, fresh water as its own thing, valuable in and of itself, which is fair enough. However, it occurred to me that we can assign a CO₂ cost to it by considering how much CO₂ is generated as a byproduct of desalination. In other words, if we’re doing something to save X amount of water, that’s worth Y amount of CO₂ emmissions. I haven’t done the math, but the hypothetical implication is that paper plates are even worse than the article describes and that dishwashing machines are even better. They might actually even payoff their own “carbon debt”.

I think the simple way to accomplish what you’re saying is to require all manufacturers and distributors to put significant deposits on their packaging. It would force them to take back their packaging for reuse or proper disposal. I would want such a measure to be paired with standardization of all packaging. There should only be one type of container for each set of similar products.