The taps on an aluminum cans, pulling tabs off and keeping them for recycle, are they worth more than cans?

they are worth the same as cans and they are made from the same aluminum.

So saving pull tabs isn't a complete waste of time. But let's make one thing clear: *there's nothing special about pull tabs*. You'd save yourself a heap o' trouble and make a lot more money if you recycled the whole can. The Reynolds and kidney foundation people have tried to get that point across with a poster showing a red Ghost busters-type slash through a cartoon of someone trying to detach a pull tab from a can. The headline says, "Keep Tabs on Your Cans." But the public hasn't gotten the message. Supposedly responsible people -- e.g., the honchos at your school -- will organize pull tab collection drives without even bothering to get the whole story. Urban legends expert Jan Brunvand reports that in 1989 a Minneapolis VFW post organized a pull tab collection drive for the local Ronald McDonald House. When Brunvand asked the organizers why they didn't tell people to save whole cans, they lamely replied that there were "hygiene problems" and that people liked mailing in the tabs, even though the postage often exceeded the value of the aluminum. In other words, it's not important to *do* good as long as people *feel* good. Sometimes I don't think we have enough common sense in this country to fill a teacup.

There are many stories out there about tabs being worth more than other forms of aluminum. In fact, that is all they are, scrap aluminum, worth from 55 cents, to 95 cents a pound, depending on where you live.

It takes 1,538 Type I Silver tabs ( I have 151 different tabs believe it or not) to make 1 pound, or 53 tabs to equal 1 clean de-tabbed beer/pop can..

many people when they hear this feel like it is not worth it, and over and over I hear, "recycle the whol;e can". That is sound advice, however, there are 11 states out there which have deposit laws, you may have trouble getting somebody to give up the $1.20 ($2.40 in Michigan) for thier case of cans, but nobody minds giving up the 24 tabs, and you would be amazed at how fast they pile up (believe me, I know, I just started filling my 12th 55 gallon drum, 2,803,000 tabs and counting)..Another way to look at it, is 100 pounds of aluminum tabs will fill a large picnic cooler, but 100 pounds of aluminum cans will fill a large van.

Let me save you a few stamps though, you do not have to mail your tabs to the McDonalds House Charities, you can just bring them to your local McDonalds, 12 years ago, McDonalds co-ordinated thier delivery system to include tabs, and close to 100,000 tabs a day are collected by the McDonalds chain.

If you have lots of tabs and are seeking personal gain, there are people out there who use the tabs for arts and crafts, my Cub Scouts have been selling tabs as part of thier Summer Camp program for $2.99 per 1,000, and it has paid for close to 80 Campers., and then we donate the damaged ones which could not be used for arts and crafts to the local McDonalds

I don't really know about the value of the pull tabs, but I know that the Kiwanis Club in Pahrump collects them to help families whose members have cancer. I believe they work in conjunction with Ronald McDonald house to do this. They are worth saving for such a great need!

the tabs are alu. as well and should be kept on as they melt the cans down and use the metal again anyways...

if they used a different metal in contact with the aluminum, the metals would react with each other and could make a hole in the can.

same metal = same price...actually they are worth less since they are smaller than the can...

URBAN LEGEND the tabs and the cans are the same value to the scrap aluminium dealer/recyclers crush the cans and tabs together bag them and deliver for the money or if a deposit take to store or deposit centre to get your money back

I think what you should do is take the pop tab off and send them in to the Ronald McDonald House. They use those pop tabs to get money for their charity. Then just recycle the can.

Nope. The can tops aren't worth any more than the rest of the can. The snopes page linked below eludes to that in reference to another pop-top myth.

Hi '

I hear the tabs are collected for wheel chairs. You should contact the disability society, they would be pleased.

http://www.thirstylizards.com/general/cantabprogra...

You can also check out this web site for info on donating them to Shriners hospital.