For comparison, 1 ml of fashionable perfume Prada Atomizer costs the buyer $1.19, the same amount of elite champagne Dom Perignon vintage 1998 costs $0.17, and 1 ml of gasoline costs less than 1 cent.
The Institute also calculated that a consumer who actively uses a printer will spend more on replacing cartridges, purchasing toner and ink over the course of a year than they spent on buying the printer itself. Moreover, toner and ink are rising in price at a colossal rate — these rates are several times higher than inflation.
Experts explain the reason for this paradox by the very limited competition in this market. Printer manufacturers strive to ensure that consumables from other companies cannot be used to refill their products. As a result, for example, hp cartridges are not compatible with Epson or Lexmark printers. And monopolists get the opportunity to dictate prices without fear of competitors.
Moreover, as Washington ProFile notes, printer manufacturers usually do not provide information on how much money a printer owner will spend on printing one page.