Comments on: Postal Service May Cut Back On Delivery Days

By: Jasmine T

Jasmine T — Fri, 20 May 2011 00:22:47 +0000

hey great thing you got going here as for what Don said:”That is the sound reason for “monopoly” that the USPS has, the sanctity of the mail”
it sure is man

By: Don Stilwell

Don Stilwell — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 05:37:11 +0000

You folks that denegrate the USPS and extoll the virtues of Fedex and UPS overlook the FACT that UPS/Fedex send their parcels that are going to seldom served areas through the USPS. It unprofitable for them to send a truck and driver many miles for the delivery of one small, low revenue item, so they let the USPS eat the expense, keeps their books in the black while USPS shows a loss.
Also you talk about privatizing the USPS. That allows many different companies to jump into the delivery of the mail. While I agree that a goodly portion of the mail is “junk,” IE advertising, political flyers, etc, I am sure you would be surprised how many Social Security checks and other sources of retirement income go through the USPS.
How many hands would you like to have going into your mailbox if you were expecting your sole source of subsistance to be there.
If your Granny’s retirement check was delivered by one privatized carrier, and the next one took it out of the mailbox, who does your Granny hold responsible?
That is the sound reason for “monopoly” that the USPS has, the sanctity of the mail
After all if it is privitized, any company that had the resources, or connections, could secure a delivery contract. How many companies sell gasoline in your city? Same rules apply.
You have to think of all of the ramifications, not just accept the easiest looking solution.

By: J

Thu, 16 Apr 2009 14:54:08 +0000

Ed: And where does money for the pensions and healthcare of postal employees come from if not the Federal government?

Companies like DHL, UPS, and Fedex seem to do a pretty damn good job of parcel delivery, what exactly is so technically challenging about mail delivery that it can be handled only by a government organization?

The beautiful thing about the free market is that, if the consumers don’t like the way you are operating, they will take their business elsewhere…. That is, as long as the government doesn’t set up a monopoly and make competition illegal (i.e. Private Express Statutes).

By: Ed

Ed — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 14:30:24 +0000

Federal subsidies? USPS receives no money from the Fed Govt, it is a self sufficient system as of 1971. Try to keep up. As for Tuesday non service day..how would this give postal employees a ‘normal workweek’? How would you like to have Sun/Tues off every week? Privatize the USPS and who is gonna put mail in your mailbox? 5 or 6 different 18 year old illegals walking the street with canvas bags on their shoulder? That’s exactly what you will get. I don’t think the american people will tolerate that very long.

By: Brian in GA

Brian in GA — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 20:25:25 +0000

There are a couple of USPS facilities that are basically run with employees from Pitney Bowes with just a couple of USPS folks around to “supervise.” I don’t know a lot of the details but the concept is interesting.

My buddy is in postal enforcement and said there are moves underway to try joint operations to cut cost. We will see.

By: The Maine View

The Maine View — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 17:00:25 +0000

I would be really surprised if they privatized the USPS during this administration. Then again, if Obama is as pragmatic as he says we could see it happen. I’d like to see them do it, as long as they could guarantee a majority of the current USPS jobs, offer early retirement, etc.

By: Doug Mataconis

Doug Mataconis — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 23:08:47 +0000

Brian In GA,

Exactly.

This talk about cutting back on service for one day is nonsense. It’s most likely a political ploy on the part of the USPS Board of Governors to get more federal money to subsidize their failing business.

By: Brian in GA

Brian in GA — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 22:54:05 +0000

You still have an organization with 700,000 career employees!!! You can drop down to 1 day a week but your fixed costs, pensions, equipment maintenance and building costs are still there!

Better to privatize, sell the assets to fund the pension plans as promised and then move on. Or even lease the facilities to a private companies.

By: kranky kritter

kranky kritter — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 21:53:20 +0000

Why not drop right down to 3 days a week right now. Snail mail is going extinct, anyway. Let the hardcopy direct mail marketers fund it.

By: Brian Krenz

Brian Krenz — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 20:51:18 +0000

I have wondered for a long time why we don’t just privatize the postal service. It’s ineffective as is, and a $6 billion deficit is unreasonable for something we don’t really need.

Email and the internets will solve most needs and FedEx/UPS/private USPS can handle the rest.

Win, win, win.

By: Doug Mataconis

Doug Mataconis — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 20:00:30 +0000

I use email or fax for most correspondence, and FedEx for time sensitive documents.

Banking and bill paying is all electronic.

So if the ~~Pony Express~~ USPS wants to put irrelevant crap and Pottery Barn catalogs in a box in front of my house one less day a week, that’s fine by me.

By: Brian in GA

Brian in GA — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 19:42:40 +0000

“First, the fewer the days the mail is delivered, the less gas the Post Office uses. Demand goes down, price goes down.”

Sorry Justin, your sound logic only applies to free economic systems. It is lost on government monopolies and heavily unionized industries. As demand goes down in this case, price will go up to support the incredible “bloat” that is built up in the labor costs of the post office and their retirement system.

This is however, another strong argument for privatization of the postal service as our government runs billion dollar budget deficits.