The US Society of the Plastics Industry designed their resin identification code in 1988 and made it similar to the recycling symbol which had been in use since 1970, even though many of the plastics thus labeled were not generally recyclable.
According to wikipedia[1] they eventually changed the RIC "chasing arrows" to a solid triangle in 2013 to address consumer confusion, but I still see a lot of plastics sporting the chasing arrow symbol.
I hope efforts like California's succeed so that the recycling symbol can be reserved for products that can be recycled in practice. (i.e. there are more than a token number of municipal facilities that process that type of plastic into a reusable form)
The ideas about government policy on product labeling became popular a bit later than that, and the resin identification codes, together with food nutritional values were the main responsible for that.
My understanding[1] is that in the 1970s the paper industry was the first to adopt a three-arrow symbol for paper products that could be recycled and later a slightly different three-arrow symbol for products that were made from recycled paper products. These seem in alignment with consumer understanding of the symbol. I also recall seeing the three arrow recycling symbol on bins at school in the 1980s so it was certainly in use by that point.
> I imagine they used the arrows because they are about recycling
Had resin identification codes restricted their use of the three-arrow design to plastics that were widely recyclable or products made from recycled plastic then I would have no issue. But some of the resin symbols (e.g. 7) essentially mean "not recyclable" and that is obviously causing confusion to consumers because people keep putting them in the plastic recycling.
It's confusing enough that the recycling center near me provides the following guidance: "The numbers on plastics are not great indicators of whether something can be recycled in a typical recycling program. Our advice is to think about the shape of your plastics. If they are clean and empty plastic bottles, jars, jugs or tubs, they are what we are looking for!"
> even if they don't mean "this product is recyclable"
Using a symbol to mean the exact opposite of its conventional meaning seems liable to cause consumer confusion.
It says so in the article you linked. It's the last column on the first chart.
Similar to how the junk food industry is all about telling people to "balance what you eat and what you do", and shrinking portion sizes while also selling "shareable" packs. They are trying to avoid customer ire and/or regulations against them.
unless you have evidence of this "great resin code conspiracy"?
However the fact that recycling programs (at least in my state) advise consumers to ignore the number and focus on the shape of the plastic means that (at least in my state) these symbols are not serving their intended purpose.
For example, many forms of polyethylene terephthalate are not recyclable even if the product is labeled with a RIC1/PETE symbol. In fact, the only time the RIC number is helpful to me is when confirming that a product is most definitely not recyclable. Of course, in those cases the use of the three-arrow recycling symbol to indicate a product's non-recycleability seems liable to confuse consumers.
This isn't the "charitable interpretation" - this was the stated and official purpose of the symbols with the numbers.
The "uncharitable interpretation" is that it was a dishonest way for plastic manufacturers to label unrecycleable plastics with recycling symbols to confuse consumers into thinking a greater number of single-use plastics were recyclable than actually were recyclable with no consideration given to the difficulties this would cause for the organizations actually responsible for recycling the plastic.
Because I was not there I do not know whether the people involved were misguided or unethical or somewhere in between.
That's why they are on the plastic, and why they have the recycle shape.
Certainly some experts at least are academically aware that U+2672 ♲, three clockwise arrows in a triangle, recycling symbol which indicates the product can be recycled or is accepted by curbside recycling pickup programs, is not the same as U+2676 ♶, three clockwise arrows in a triangle with a tiny number inside indicating LDPE resin, which typically means the product is not accepted for recycling.
But this is not common knowledge. I hope you're not confused into thinking that the average consumer knows the difference between the resin symbols and the recycling symbol!