Inkjet printers are inefficient and wasteful: We all hear those stories of government waste, and it makes us crazy. In fact, did you know we spent $2.7 million recently to encourage Chinese prostitutes to drink less. We were billed another $60,000 by the IRS for their awesome “Star Trek parody” video that was shown at their recent leadership conference. (Wow, was that directed by Scorsese?)

Anyway, we can’t do much about how the government wastes our money, so let’s look closer to home. In fact, let’s look at your inkjet printer.

We’ve already mentioned how expensive printer ink is, so at least it’s being used efficiently, right?

Wrong! According to Consumer Reports, about 50% of that printer ink never hits the page. In fact, the worst offenders only output about 30% of their ink to the pages! So, why are inkjet printers so wasteful? It seems that the culprit is the intermittent use of our printers.

Print Less Frequently, Waste More Ink

Basically what that means is that most people don’t buy an ink cartridge and use it all up in one week. More likely, people print a few pages here and there, and this is where the waste begins. The printer uses much of the ink in self-maintenance and cleaning, and ends up sitting in a reservoir inside the printer. (What a little diva!)

Printer companies are well aware of this, and on HP’s website states that, “Some ink must be used to maintain the health of the print head; some ink is residual; and some ink evaporates.”

How many pages can you get out of an inkjet cartridge?

What this means is that a manufacturer might imply that you can print 400 pages from one OEM (genuine name brand) inkjet cartridge, but in reality it’s going to be closer to 200 pages because of the intermittent use of our printers.

Consumer Reports also found no correlation between the amount of ink used in maintenance and performance, and no correlation to the price paid for ink and quality. In other words, (unlike a sweet 1970’s muscle car) it isn’t really necessary for them to waste that much fuel, or to pay for the high octane.

What can an honest taxpayer do? Well, as far as the government waste, we’re all stuck, but consider buying generic name brand compatible ink instead. Want to save even more money? Grab a coupon for 4inkjets or 123inkjets and save an extra 10-20%!

Want to save on custom printing online for business cards and more? Check out the latest coupons here.