You're still thinking in terms of the whole imprecise game of trying to get, induce, tempt, cajole, lecture, nag, incentivize and/or shame people ("end users")

You're still thinking in terms of the whole imprecise game of trying to get, induce, tempt, cajole, lecture, nag, incentivize and/or shame people ("end users") into voluntarily contributing some of the time/energy/cost it takes to recycle. What they're suggesting at least with the WEEE thing (lost opportunity to make it say WEEED dudebro! ahem where was I) is that they forcibly take, from the producer of the item, some portion of the costs of recycling, and then downstream use that money... to do the recycling. Which seems a lot more direct and obvious, but maybe I misunderstood that part.