Paper bags VS Plastic Bags?

In my city, plastic bags have been banned from all stores, and if a means to carry groceries or other items were necessary, a consumer would have to purchase a paper bag or bring a reusable one from home. Obviously, whoever created and passed the law agreed that plastic bags were worse for the environment compared to biodegradable paper bags. But is that a fact, or really just a popular opinion? The United States alone cuts down 14 million trees to simply supply the demand for paper bags. Paper bags also tend to weigh more than 10 times as much as plastic bags. When all the weight adds up, it takes much more fuel to ship these monstrosities. In landfills, paper bags produce more than twice as much atmospheric waste as plastic ones. But hold on. That doesn't in any way mean plastic bags are good for our environment either. According to the Wall Street Journal, only 1% of all plastic bags are recycled. The rest, are shipped to live in landfills. One plastic shopping bag can take up to 1000 years to decompose. That's like watching a snail circling around the entire Earth. 10% of the trash and debris on the US coastline are plastic bags. I can confidently conclude that both types of bags are equally as terrible as the other. Next time you go on a shopping trip, whether it is to Safeway or Macy's, make sure you bring something that won't hurt the already wounded planet we live on.