The American people need to have a conversation about the US Postal Service. President Donald Trump has indicated that he wants to make changes to the agency, which has stitched together physically the US population through mail delivery for 250 years.
This national conversation involves young people even more than the crotchety crowd that grew up visiting the post office and still buy stamps. That’s because the Postal Service is the backbone of US e-commerce, delivering more online goods than any other courier. Trump is right that the Postal Service needs an overhaul, but a lot of that work is already underway.
In typical fashion of how information flows these days, the president confirmed he wants to shake things up while answering questions after Howard Lutnick was sworn in as Commerce Secretary last week. It turns out that Lutnick will likely play a central role in the Postal Service’s future. Trump said, “We’re thinking about that,” when asked if there was a plan afoot to move the Postal Service under Commerce’s purview.
Trump is clearly fixated on the Postal Service’s financial struggles over the years, using a form of the word “lose” five times during his 36-second answer about the fate of the agency. Stemming the billions of dollars in losses is no doubt a worthy goal. But halting investments on a needed transformation that’s already underway or blindly slashing the workforce — the blunt-edged tool of the Department of Government Efficiency — would be counterproductive.
