Currently, when a bill is introduced into Congress, the Government Printing Office (GPO) automatically prints five copies of the entire text for the office of each co-sponsor. That means that for H.R. 3962, the House’s health care bill, which is 2,070 pages long and has 7 total sponsors, the GPO printed out a total of 72,450 pages. That’s 151 reams.
The STOP the Overprinting Act would only allow bills to be printed by the GPO if they are specifically requested by a member of Congress or a committee. According to Lee, “the Congressional Research Service estimates the potential cost savings of Lee’s legislation would be upwards of $2.2 million in 2010 alone.”