Why a short press can cut a whole stack
A hole punch turns a hand’s movement into a much stronger push. Its handle pivots around a joint: because your hand presses far from that pivot while the punches sit close to it, the handle multiplies the force delivered to the paper. The tradeoff is distance. Your hand moves through a longer arc than the punches travel, giving them the pressure needed to cut several sheets at once.
Cutting, not tearing
Each punch is a hollow steel cylinder with a sharpened rim. As it descends, that rim concentrates the force along a narrow circle, separating the paper fibers around the edge. The punch passes into a slightly larger opening in the base, which gives the cut material somewhere to go without making the metal collide with the base.
The resulting paper circles, often called chads, collect inside the tool. That hidden compartment is part of the practical design: without it, the small scraps would scatter across the desk after each press. The familiar clean holes come from a sequence of controlled actions—a lever supplies force, a sharp rim shears the paper, and the base supports the cut.
