Let me first not that printing was a little sub point.
Second, in what you quote from: easier and nicer than to read it on a screen.
So your argument seems to be that it is equally nice to read fewer lines of paper in a smaller font. Huh? Also, my eyes can't handle 4 pages on a page any more -- and your eyes won't be able to do that after 40, either.
We no longer live in the days of typewriters or daisychain printers with fixed column widths.
We now have these wonderful things called laser printers which can print using fonts.
Fonts are resizeable. Even to the point that 150+ columns could be fit on one unbroken line.
And even lines that long can be quite readable if you print in landscape.