The idea of a paperless society? It will never happen, but the idea of paper-less is happening.

For 35 years, prophets of the “paperless office” have been waiting for any convincing shred of evidence that Americans are less committed to paper.

The paradox of the digital age, at least until the economy soured, is that a Web-connected, wireless world was using far more paper than it did before trashing its typewriters. About a year ago, however, Jake Wang noticed a reversal in one trend he has tracked for years from an office in Los Angeles. Using computer software that monitors the whirring of 700,000 printers and multifunctional devices in businesses, Wang charted the first-ever drop in the number of pages Americans were printing. “It was like going over a waterfall,” said Wang, an analyst for the business consultant and market-research firm IDC. “Starting with the fourth quarter of 2008, we saw a definite drop in page outputs,” which nonetheless totaled 1.5 trillion pages for the year – or 5,000 sheets of printouts per man, woman and child. That number will be lower this year, perhaps by more than 10 percent, although it had been climbing steadily since 2000. A temporary effect of the slow economy, or the beginning of a society truly less glued to paper?

“When an economy sheds millions of workers, there are that many employees who aren’t doing the printing,” Wang said. “I’m thinking fewer contracts are signed. Fewer documents sent from one person to another.”  He expects our passion for printouts to climb again when the economy does, maybe in 2011, but the dip in pages printed does parallel a downward slide in the number of pieces of first-class mail being delivered by the U.S. Postal Service, which peaked in 2006. Postal officials do not anticipate ever delivering so many cards, letters and utility bills again, even after the recovery.

“The idea of a paperless society? It will never happen, and I do believe that,” said Xerox Senior Vice President Jim Joyce, “but the idea of paper-less is happening.” By that, he means we really ought to be using less paper in the coming decade because of the convergence of four trends:

• The pressure on businesses to cut costs where they can, especially in a weak economy.
• Technology that will reduce paper output, erase printouts and make reading off a screen easier.
• Concerns for the environment (with paper manufacturers being the fourth-largest user of fossil fuels on the planet, Joyce said).

To be sure, generational preferences dictate the paper trends. To older people, “there’s a psychology to paper, reading something on paper you can hold,” said Karen Unger, founder of the Florida-based American Document Management Co. “I’m old enough to know: There are people who just really need to have things on paper.”

Yet that feeling of control is something the younger generation doesn’t seem to have the need for,” she said, particularly those who spent their youth on the couch with a laptop on their bellies. A recent Forrester Research survey showed the popularity of electronic bank statements hitting a wall this year, with roughly half of online consumers sticking to paper statements only. Seniors and Baby Boomers, when compared to younger people, were twice as likely to voice concerns for privacy and a need to have “the paper version for my records.”

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