The history, business and politics of trash is interesting, and rife with conspiracies and conspiracy theories. I don't have all of the good resources handy to cite, but I've done some reading on it. Much of the policy and methodology of our waste management is motivated by money more than anything.
Here's a summary: early in age of industrialization and city growth in America there were many ways of handling trash explored. One of these was industrial composting, where the bulk of trash could be used to enrich farm fields. From what I've read many of the large municipal governments were investing in the composting method, but then politics and money got in the way. For one, municipal composting created a problem for the then-budding industries of non-compostable materials, such as glass and plastics. They could see that if compost became the standard for refuse disposal, their materials would be less desirable. And in the early days, there wasn't much technology or impetus for recycling those non-compostables, so the manufacturers advocated for simple disposal, i.e. burying.
Concurrently, in the late 19th and early 20th century, as the cities kept growing and producing more trash, entrepreneurs began making money from hauling and dumping it, and the industry of waste disposal was born. Landowners recognized the growing need for disposal sites and saw a profitable use for otherwise useless ground such as spent quarries, mines, stagnant farmland, etc. Thus the commercial landfill industry was born.
Now an interesting twist: as the industry grew and consolidated, the operators realized 2 things: 1) it was more efficient long-term to operate larger, more centralized landfills than smaller local ones; and 2) in many cases they could actually make more profit charging more to haul trash farther. Thus resulted a seemingly paradoxal case of an industry supporting it's own demonization, as the trash trade quietly fed the "Not in my backyard" movement that saw local landfills closed and trash hauled to farther destinations. If the changes were demanded by residents, the companies could justify the added expense. I'm sure the labor unions didn't mind the additional employees needed either.
Here's a couple sources:
https://www.biocycle.net/the-man-who-discovered-the-divine-materials-in-compost/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Management_(corporation)
