Blair's response is pretty much what I wanted to say. There are many ways we can get the money to fund this bill, which is a fairly modest reduction in costs for Atlasians.
According to
Forbes, 42% of Americans own passports which has been steadily increasing over time. According to the
US government, 21,103,475 passports were issued per year. Lets say 10% of those were new applicants, which seems a little high given the trajectory, but lets give us some room. The price for a passport under this bill is $125, down from $135.
10*21,103,475 is $211,034,750.
So the reduction in fees from section 3 costs $211 million.
21,103,475/10 is 2,110,348. 2,110,348*125 is $263,793,500.
So the elimination of first time fees costs $264 million.
Passport photos vary in price significantly but $15 seems to be the number for post offices. Someone more informed on that can correct me if I'm wrong on that.
21,103,475*15 is $316,552,125.
So the elimination of passport photo in section 2 costs around $317 million.
So the total cost of the bill is around $782 million. I believe this is something worth paying and as Blair said, we can find a way to maintain support to post offices.