Shipping and write off is much cheaper than disposal.
I recall as college students finding a VAX 780 on the "getting rid of it" part of the engineering loading dock and we got permission to get rid of it for them. Pushing it down the street at 11pm was interesting (getting a weird look from a police car going by).
It got gutted for parts (power supplies don't care too much about what they power) and converted into a lockable bookshelf and 14" diameter wall hangings (and some surprisingly strong magnets).
The "yea, we let a bunch of college students take it" was a significant savings over getting a truck to haul it off to some junkyard even before the days of being very picky about electronics recycling.
I recall as college students finding a VAX 780 on the "getting rid of it" part of the engineering loading dock and we got permission to get rid of it for them. Pushing it down the street at 11pm was interesting (getting a weird look from a police car going by).
It got gutted for parts (power supplies don't care too much about what they power) and converted into a lockable bookshelf and 14" diameter wall hangings (and some surprisingly strong magnets).
The "yea, we let a bunch of college students take it" was a significant savings over getting a truck to haul it off to some junkyard even before the days of being very picky about electronics recycling.