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- The U.S. postmaster general says the U.S. Postal Service could run out of money as soon as a year from now.
- That raises questions about the future of mail delivery in America.
The Post Office (as it is often called) lost $9 billion in the fiscal year that ended in September. Its 640,000 workers, 525,00 of which are career personnel, are a burden. The American Postal Workers Union represents 200,000 current workers and retirees. They have resisted privatization, which might save the USPS money.
Among the financial drags on the USPS is that it delivers mail and packages Monday through Saturday via a system anchored by just over 31,000 locations. Virtually every American home and business benefits from this. That includes people in both large cities and rural areas, where homes can be miles apart. To say the system is antiquated is to state the obvious.
Many Americans do not need the USPS at all. They communicate through email instead of physical mail. Most “packages” could be email attachments. Tens of millions of Americans get and pay their bills online. To make a case for daily delivery and such a large number of post offices is nearly impossible.
This author is an Ivy League elitist who has demonstrated his ignorance about the USPS many times over the years. He doesn’t care for the universal mandate and would sacrifice rural Americans and the mail service they depend on because he sees no need for them or their opinions. Most of his pieces are poorly thought out and researched and are just for content.