@realcaseyrollins

All* the countries ahead of the USA on the list are ones that actively import plastic waste for profit. Nominally it's a recycling operation, but oversight is lacking in many of these places and plenty of it ends up not being recycled for one reason or another. It's ultimately Western countries' garbage in large part.

* China actually banned such imports in 2018. The attribution is vague, not including a date - I suspect the author used data from before the Chinese ban.