Why do we still have a postal service? In 2021, the agency cost federal taxpayers around $18 billion in operating and capital subsidies. Plus, in 2022, Congress bailed it out from having to pay $56 billion of employee health care obligations, meaning federal taxpayers are now obligated to cover those costs.
Around 250 years ago, mail was the closest thing the prospective nation had to the internet. When the Continental Congress was forming the fledging U.S. government, it decided in 1775 that America’s mail should be carried by a federal agency, not the states or private enterprise. One reason for creating a federal post office was to bring the country closer together, as distances would be less important if it cost the same to mail a letter across the country as across the street. This was critical as the land area of the original 13 states was far bigger than any European country other than Russia.
James Madison, however, had a more sinister reason for a federalized post office. He had the agency charge high prices for first-class mail so it could subsidize mailing of highly politicized newspapers that his party (and others) sent out for electioneering. Just as the internet has polarized the nation today, subsidized newspaper delivery polarized the country in the elections from 1796 through 1804.
Today, the justifications for a federal post office, good and bad, no longer apply. Phone calls cost the same whether they are made across the street or across the country. Email and other internet services cost the same whether the information is sent across the street or around the world. Amazon and many other on-line sellers charge the same for shipping no matter where people live, and the biggest ones don’t use the Postal Service to deliver their products.
The Postal Service moved 127 billion pieces of mail last year. Slightly less than 10 percent were standard first-class letters and an even smaller share was packages and periodicals, meaning more than 80 percent was unsolicited junk mail. Do we really have to pay $18 billion a year so we can be subjected to this waste of our time and paper resources?
The Antiplanner may be feeling some sour grapes as my own experiences with postal delivery have earned the agency less than five stars. Several years ago, when I had a speaking engagement in California, I had shipped some books to my host’s address well in advance. Camp Sherman’s post office was so small it didn’t even have a postage meter, so the mail clerk carefully stuck the right amount of stamps on the box. The books arrived at the right address on time. As the mail carrier was bringing the box to the door, however, he noticed the stamps and decided this was a “suspicious package,” so he returned it to the local post office for inspection. No book sales that trip.
The security of postal operations is so dubious that the Postal Service itself has warned the public not to send checks through the mail because mail thefts are rapidly rising. Sometimes, however, there’s no viable alternative.
Recently, I filed a freedom of information request with an Oregon state agency. The agency demanded $25 for its time fulfilling the request. It refused to take credit cards, electronic fund transfers, or anything other than paper checks. Since the alternative was driving 100 miles each way to Salem, I reluctantly put a check in the mail that should have arrived in two days. Instead, it took three weeks before they finally admitted they received it.
I don’t believe the Postal Service actually took that long to deliver the check, but the state agency is obligated to fulfill the request within two weeks of receiving the check. By claiming it hadn’t arrived, they were able to add three weeks to that time period. This probably isn’t the Postal Service’s fault, but if we didn’t have a Postal Service, it is likely the agency would have been forced to accept credit cards and wouldn’t have this excuse to delay the dissemination of public information.
Even more recently, I ordered items from Colorado, Florida, and Wisconsin. All three items fit into 9″x12″ or smaller envelopes. Tracking revealed that all three ordered arrived in Portland on August 13. Normally, the next step would be to send them to Bend and then to Camp Sherman. For those not familiar with Oregon geography, Camp Sherman is on the way from Portland to Bend, but the Postal Service routes everything we get through Bend anyway.
Unfortunately, instead of going to Bend, all three items got misshipped to Burns, about 130 miles away. The Burns post office shipped two of them back to Portland. For those not familiar with Oregon geography, both Camp Sherman and Bend are on the way from Burns to Portland, but the Postal Service routed them through Portland anyway. Despite the identical routings, one of them arrived on August 18 while the other didn’t arrive until August 19.
The third item took a more roundabout route. After being shipped from Denver on August 11 and arriving in Portland on August 13 and Burns on August 15 (the same day as the other two packages), Burns shipped it to Nashville, Tennessee. For those not familiar with U.S. geography, Nashville is not on the way from Burns to Bend, Camp Sherman, or Portland.
The Nashville post office sent it to the Memphis Mail Processing Annex, which shipped it to the Memphis Logistical Center. While you might think that the logistical center might logically send it back to Portland, instead it shipped it to Sacramento. Sacramento sent it to Eugene, which sent it to Portland, which finally sent it to Bend and Camp Sherman. Total travel time was 14 days for a shipment that should have taken 4 days.
Mistakes happen, but if FedEx or UPS had committed an error like this, it is likely that the shipper could have demanded a refund. The Postal Service has no enforceable performance criteria and little incentive to make sure that packages arrive on time.
This little story may be amusing, but it isn’t necessarily a reason to abolish the Postal Service. The fact that the USPS loses so much money duplicating the services of private and profitable businesses is. Andrew Napolitano argues that we should sell the Postal Service. He is right.
Customers will cry, “How will I pay my bills?”
Closing USPS would result in much hand wringing and renting of garments by the non-profits that make up the majority of our mail. They would likely convince Congress to pay for hardware and internet connectivity for certain low-income and extremely rural “customers”. A windfall for Starlink.
Next should be brick & mortar libraries. They are functionally obsolete. Where I live, libraries have devolved into expensive warming (winter) and cooling (summer) huts for homeless bums.
Aarrgghh! Rending of garments.
I’ve always been a bit amused that the “we should do X cuz Europe does X” never seems to call for the USPS to be privatized like some other European countries have done.
Nor Europe’s abortion term limits.
We dont worship europe like its paradise on earth, it has problems too. A far right party founded by a literal nazi officer in france has a rising voter base and is currently at 30% (not to mention the oppression of muslim immigrants there), european countries across the board are overregulating farmers (specifically livestock ones) to hit climate goals rather than regulate actual oil companies, and a lot of eastern Europe hates queer people, and some countries there are democracies only on paper like Hungary. But just because they have their own problems doesnt mean we cant learn anything from them. The dutch have the most people friendly cities on the planet, the swiss have the best train network (though personally I think its a little overdone), and iceland has no measurable wage gap between men and women. Not to mention their food regulation is pretty much supreme across the board but thats less them being exceptional and us just being bad at it. In relation to USPS, i feel like most people dont care either way and that we have bigger priorities, but thats just my opinion. I only worry about how this would end up affecting mail in ballots which, if negative, would disenfrachise a lot of working class, disabled, and elderly voters.