The road they drove to dump this trash literally takes to the landfill

Maybe they got to the dump and there was a big sign and chain across the dump saying “Closed on Thanksgiving” and they had never heard of a dump closed on Thanksgiving before and with tears in their eyes they drove off into the sunset looking for another place to put the garbage. They didn’t find one. ‘Til they came to a side road and off the side of the side road there was another fifteen foot cliff and at the bottom of the cliff was another pile of garbage. And they decided that one big pile is better than two little piles and rather than bring that one up they decided to throw theirs down.
- Kid, we found your name on an envelope under a half a ton of garbage.
- And you do what everyone else does, drop it off at the gate and leave cash.
- 🎶Dun dun dun🎶

Increases the cost to the community many times, but it's free for one person

Ah, the old Coon Hill Rd. special. Grew up near a wooded country road that was full of trash like this. People apparently came from all around the township to dump their trash and furniture up and down this road, and the county never bothered to clean it up. My family was never down with that, but my dad used to catch possums in his livetraps and relocate them on this exact road. I guess he didn't know how beneficial it was to have possums around. Coon Hill may have been lined with trash, but it was likely 100% tick free.
I had to do a school project once where we took disposal cameras and snapped photos of things that we found beautiful, and things we found ugly. I knocked out almost all of the ugly ones just on Coon Hill, but I did snap a few beautiful ones off the beaten path a bit. It was in the dead of winter and mostly snow and rotting vegetation, but beautiful enough at the right time of day. There was a duality down Coon Hill.
I swear I wasn't a redneck, but it sure sounds like it.
- Thank you for writing this. You painted the scene very well I can tell you learned a lot from your art teachers!
  
  Thanks! Very kind of you to say.

As the squeeze continues, the trash dumps will increase. It costs money to dump trash appropriately. Out of all the utilities, trash pickup will likely be sacrificed first. This isn’t an endorsement.
- Meh. It's got far better in my lifetime. (My anecdotes span 3 states and 40 years.) Used to be the residential trash guys were picky bastards, never knew what refuse they would refuse. Now they pop the lid, no car batteries, sulfuric acid or tires? Good to go.
  Used to be everything that didn't fit in the can had to be burned or hauled. My guys will pick up about anything that fits in a 4'x 8' space if you give a call. And they'll do it 4 times a month. No charge.
  Not so environmentally great, but we have 2 trash haulers in competition. Company A piss you off? Company B will take over the next day.

If you litter, fuck yourself.

Littering really pisses me off. I've seen kids throw trash on the ground when a trash can was 5 ft away. Infuriating.
- You would fucking DIE if I took you back to 70s America. I truly love how offended people get by littering, I really do!
  Trash was piled on the side of every road, especially highways. People just chunked their McDonald's bag when they were done, no big deal.
  I've hauled a couple hundred pounds of crap out the woods surrounding our hood. About gave me a stroke on the larger items. But I keep at it, and it seems to prevent the broken window effect. Hadn't been out in 3-weeks, figured it would be awful. Nah. Only got a single grocery bag out, and half was my own beer cans! (I did drag an electric scooter out. Fuck me. Try that over 1/2 mile of deep sand.)
  
  I can't tell if you're minimizing the problem because you think it used to be worse. If so, that's pretty uncool, unlike the cleanups which you're doing. Those are cool.
  
  I worked on regular cleanups of a wetlands near my old apt and the bike path that ran by. We'd pull literally tons of crap out of there but over time it got less and less.
  I remember the 70s-80s and the trash but that doesn't excuse littering even less now.
- You are legally allowed to beat them with the trash.
  
  You are legally ~~allowed~~ obligated to beat them with the trash.
  FTFY

I balk at the idea of paying to dump your junk in a landfill site. I pay myself but that silly system only leads to broke people having to dump elsewhere.

Everything that costs money (evermore, at that) will see people decline to pay in favour of saving the cost. This shouldn't cost the public money to do, it should be taken care of by the county.
- I think it's true that not every landfill charges
  Edit: op said they only charge for specific items at that location so it probably would've been free
  
  We use a regional landfill and they charge your hometown. It’s only for hazardous waste so the town get pissed if you waste their money with insufficient items or something that can go in trash or recycling
  But I still have old style fluorescent tubes in my basement. What do I do as they burn out and are replaced by LED? Because of mercury, trash won’t take them. However I’ll never have enough to make up for the $50 my town is charged. Plus the last thing I want to do is accumulate old tubes that will eventually get broken and contaminate my house

In truth at least here Most of that type of dumping comes from the landfill being closed. Lazy people in general don't know the schedule of a facility and as a result there are game cameras on most dumping spots near the local landfill. Every now and then they catch someone in the act and make a big production number in the prosecution. With some getting community service picking up trash on the side of the road.

Yea but dumping it there is free.

What you do when no one is looking is your true character.

So they're lazy and stupid.

Wouldn't law enforcement be able to find a couple of receipts or something that could indicate who it was that threw all this away? It'd be so satisfying to issue a massive fine to the assholes who did this.
- That would involve actual police work. They don't even process rape kits brought to them.
- If. Old bottles, pizza boxes, etc aren't going to identify you.
- "Someone stole my trash"
  
  ^ Right here. Company I worked at had trash dropped in the back of one our service vehicles (as well as some straight up vandalism), had lots of personally identifying info and the culprit had already made themselves well known to our staff a couple weeks prior. Guy told the police the trash was stolen and nothing further ever happened with it.

Probably didn't want to pay / put effort into sorting it. Sad.

They didn't sort in any way and there was extra cost, so they decided to dump it on the road?
- I don't think it would've cost anything. They charge only for very few specific things.
  
  Here, if you exclude hazardous materials, unsorted generic waste is most expensive, burnable materials, house appliances and electronics are free.
  Some clueless assholes are surprised by this, leave and dump their cargo soon after the exit gate, just to say fuck you.

Carefully check for labels with name and address and then contact the authorities.
- The government won't do shit, and shouldn't. Let's say you and I are neighbors and I hate your guts. Guess where I'm going with this. All I need to do is get a letter out your trash and stuff it in couch.
  Without video evidence, there's no evidence, not the kind local authorities are qualified to track, or have the time and money to track.
  
  It all comes down to plausibility. A repeat offender that clearly doesn't give a flying fuck or somebody that pays for trash collection services and has no reason to dump their garbage but they also have an asshole neighbour with a personal vendetta. Or it is building materials and that address just had work done Or they paid a contractor for work and cleaning up and the contractor dumped it on the forest. I'm sure the authorities won't bother with it if it happens once but when it's the second or third time with the same suspect, well then you actually have a case.