What's the Deal With the 10-Cent Bottle Deposit?

If you’ve ever bought a soda or a case of beer in Michigan, you’ve paid it: an extra dime per can or bottle, tacked onto the price. Bring the empties back, feed them into the machine at the grocery store, and you get your dimes back. Newcomers find it baffling. Michiganders find it second nature — and weirdly emotional.

Here are the facts people get fuzzy on. Michigan’s 10-cent deposit is tied for the highest in the country — Oregon also charges a dime, while most other deposit states charge just a nickel. It was created by the “Bottle Bill,” which Michigan voters passed directly by referendum on November 2, 1976. The goal was simple: give people a money reason not to toss cans out the car window. And it worked spectacularly — for decades, Michigan’s return rate was above 90%, sometimes as high as 97%, the best in the nation. (It’s slipped since the pandemic, down to around 75%, but that still beats most nickel-deposit states.)

A couple of things even locals don’t realize: because the Bottle Bill was a voter-initiated law, the state constitution requires a three-fourths supermajority in both legislative chambers to change it — making it extraordinarily hard to repeal. And retailers are only legally required to refund you up to $25 worth per person per day, which is why a giant haul can mean visiting more than one store.

Fun footnote: this exact law was the plot of a famous Seinfeld episode, where Kramer and Newman scheme to haul a truck full of New York cans to Michigan to cash in on the dime. The catch they hit — the $25-per-store limit — is real Michigan law.