Clearly 1966 isn’t visible in the rearview of memories of most people alive.
And even fewer have bought rolls of 100 first-class stamps that took just a couple of months to deplete or were around in the days where you actually had to lick stamps to place them on an envelope.
Now let’s look at today’s United States Postal Service according to the federal General Accountability Office:
*Last Friday, it reported losing $2 billion in the second quarter.
*It is on pace to run out of cash in early 2027.
*The Postal Service has about maxed out the $15 billion they are authorized by Congressional statute to borrow from the US Treasury.
*They are either not making or only partially making required annual funding payments toward its liabilities for retiree health and pension benefits.
*Mail volume has declined 49 percent from its peak of 231.1 million pieces in 2006 to 108.78 million pieces in 2025.
*Meanwhile, delivery points are up 16 percent from 146.2 million in 2006 to 170.5 million in 2025.
*71 percent of the system’s delivery routes are financially underwater.
*On-time first class mail performance has declined from 91 percent in 2022 to 86 percent in 2025. That occurred despite the decision in 2022 to lower delivery standards for certain first class mail from a 1-to-3- day delivery window to a 1-to-5-day window.
*It has lost money in every fiscal year except for one since 2007.
*During that time, accumulated Postal Service losses are at $118 billion.
Even in the fantasy world the Congress operates in, it is clear shackles such as delivery service mandates and not closing post offices while mandating the Postal Service be self-sufficient is akin to attaching concrete ankle weights to someone and then tossing them into them open and telling them to swim.
The Postal Service needs to be allowed to slash home delivery from six days a week to two or three. And they should be allowed to shutter post offices in favor of kiosk-style operations.
People and businesses can adjust to a lower delivery frequency better than the Postal Service going belly-up.
Agree wholeheartedly…just like people got used to delivery once per day rather than twice per day in 1950.
This is the dumbest opinion piece I’ve read today and on my show tonight I will refute some of this.
Hopefully they will start with 5 day delivery, not 2or 3. They could save Alot of money by cutting positions if they would start from top of chain. Way too many bosses. Every boss has a boss which is unnecessary!!
How about just letting Congress give then their money back from paying retirees from the Post Office Department since 1970? Thats close to 100 Billion owed, or maybe let them invest their tsp instead of making them buy treasury bonds. Oh here is another idea, make the military pay back their portion of retiree benefits the Post Office is forced to cover for former service members who buy their time back. I bet all those would make a massive difference and not cost jobs.
This is a government service, its not meant to make money. No one bats an eye or says the DoD “lost” 1.5 Trillion this year