Is it time to end the US Postal Service?

Some thoughts:

- We should definitely consider changes to the mail delivery system, things like no Saturday delivery or maybe just delivering three days a week.
- Because some or most people do not find value in advertising, that doesn't mean that everyone doesn't. If those mail circulars did not drive business, for profit businesses wouldn't send them. Studies during newspaper strikes have shown that the average prices people on the low end of the economic spectrum pay for everyday items go up when they lose access to advertising. I remember in my childhood going through those circulars and newspaper inserts looking for coupons or sales. That I can afford to throw them out these days doesn't mean I've forgotten how they helped our family keep a few dollars in our pockets.
- The mail system is a significant vector for political advertising. Many people might consider that a negative, but curtailing it limits how candidates can reach broad swaths of the electorate with their message. I don't know that there is another avenue where someone can directly deliver their message as wide ranging and direct as the mail system, especially when other local media platforms are increasingly being purchased by conglomerates with their own agendas.
- Not everyone has easy access to digital delivery. From where I sit surrounded by computers and high speed access, it is easy to overlook that a significant portion of the US (almost 20%) does not have any sort of Internet subscription. These people skew towards the poor and elderly and include both my parents who still write out checks and use paper pay stubs that arrive in the mail.

I'm pretty much all electronic and I definitely think that is the wave of the future, but until we have something like the Rural Electrification Act to get digital access across the country, we are going to need the mail system.

A good review of the value of so-called snail-mail. I would, though, like to make one point. Members of the House enjoy a good deal of the advantage of incumbency, and both houses of Congress benefit a good deal from distributing their message by ground mail, and that is because of their franking privilege. With volunteers stuffing envelopes, the ability to drop off boxes of their literature at a post office, which then distributes their message at no additional charge gives them an edge over challengers. I think it's pretty obvious that Congress is not going to legislate to end their franking privileges.

Hey man, don't **** with the Konstitution!

I don’t often use the post office, but I’m very glad they are there.

I can’t remmeber if our tax dollars fund them or if they fund themselves but I’ll be happy to send them a couple bucks per year to keep on keeping on.

Heard this article on NPR this morning concerning how the US Postal Service inadvertently subsidizes international shipping rates. Interesting if you have four minutes to listen.

As far as I know, the US Post Office is the only part of the federal government that is funded, to a significant extent, through advertising revenue.

Cool. Even better. Why should they go anywhere if they're able to largely sustain themselves?

I'd support the PO if it were funded 100% by the government; the fact that it's not even close to that is a plus and makes this thing a non-issue to me.

I mean, many of these arguments could be made about brick-and-mortar banks too...but as long as they're able to sustain themselves I'll just have to suffer with driving by 3503 different bank branches on my way to work.

Interesting! I did not know that.....I wonder if this will be still in place now that IQ-45 has entered a trade war with China, Europe, Canada and the rest of the world.

Better bank branches than churches

You point out an important difference between banks and the post office. Banks are able to sustain themselves.

Not all of 'em.

.....and soon, less of them!

Sending checks and letters through the mail it's still ridiculously cheap at $0.44. Try sending a letter through UPS or FedEx for $0.44 and you'll be laughed out of there. Junk mail is responsible for keeping these prices low.

You said that the post office is able to sustain itself too.

I bet the government saves a pretty penny on shipping through the USPS.

THAT is enough reason, for me, to keep the post office.

Yeah, I sometimes send a postcard to Phantom Ranch at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. I like to think of some poor letter carrier carrying my postcard down while riding a mule.

1. I can send an email faster, cheaper and more reliably than you can send a letter. I can pay bills instantly... or I can set up automatic payments that I don't have to think about each month.

2. The postal service has a monopoly, and doesn't pay taxes. It still loses about $5 billion a year.

Part of the rationale for "demoting" the Post Office Department from a cabinet level department to the U. S. Postal Service in the early 1970s was that it was to be made to pay its own way. Can't say how successful they were . . .

I would be willing to pay more to send a letter if I didn't have to bag up 10lbs of junk paper every week and haul it out to the trash.

Of course... I can't even remember the last time I had to Snail Mail something. Maybe once a year? If even that.