Is this nitpicking?

A big thank you to OhMyGov.Com for alerting me to this story ….

Imagine printing out an unnecessary extra page every time you print a two-page document, and then having someone else pay for it. In so many words, this process describes the extent of waste involved in federal government printing. According to a study released by Lexmark International, $440.4 million of the annual $1.3 billion spent on government printing costs is wasteful.

As descriptions of government spending increasingly mention “trillion,” a mere $440 million seems trivial. However, unlike controversial spending such as TARP money, stimulus packages or auto bailouts, this waste is indefensible even to federal employees. According to the study, 92 percent admit they do not need all of the documents they print in a day. Furthermore, employees discard 35 percent of printed pages in the same day. 

The results from Lexmark indicate a two-part problem.  Chiefly, accountability operates at a bare minimum. Only 11 percent of agencies have policies in place dictating when to print. Fewer than 10 percent of agencies have automatic double-sided printing, and just 5 percent require personal codes to print.

Clearly, this lack of individual accountability leads to lack of restraint. Over 60 percent of employees admitted to printing “significantly more” while working in the office compared to working at home. There may be no such thing as a free lunch, but federal employees seem to believe in free printing. 

Do you think that the same problem may exist in State and Local governments?

Is it a small problem … a big problem … or nitpicking?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 20th, 2009 at 4:02 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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