Is Recycling a Waste?

I read an article from Mother jones. Earth day started about 40 years ago. April 22, 1970. Around 3,000 voluntary recylcing programs sprung up around the country. Americans now recycle a third of their trash and that's up 6 percent from 1970. Yet we are doing all these things and they say americans are still generating more waste then ever. In just 5 minutes we use another 1,060,000 aluminum cans, 2 million plastic bottles, and 15 million sheets of paper. Our country is still drowning in plastic. People are questioning whether recycling is a waste? If we didn't recycle at all, think about how much waster we would have then. I don't think it's a waste because even if animals are still dieing from our waste and we are still having lots of problems; we could be causing a lot more deaths and problems by not doing it. I'm sure are number of problems would double or even triple! Recycling should never be thought about as a waste.