Posted on 04/17/2013 6:25:16 AM PDT by Kaslin
Even parts of government that look like a business never get run with the efficiency of a business. Just look at the post office.
They buy commercials and tout their services the way private businesses do. They offer a service that customers want.
But a real business can't get away with losing billions every year. (I guess in the era of bailouts, I should say shouldn't get away with it.) The post office lost $16 billion last year, despite having all sorts of advantages that most private businesses don't have.
They have a near monopoly on first-class mail delivery. You want to deliver something to someone? You better not put it in their mailbox -- that's illegal. The U.S. Postal Service doesn't pay sales tax or property tax. They don't even pay parking tickets.
With advantages like that, how do they lose money?
They are part of the government, under the thumb of Congress, and that invites calcified, inefficient behavior.
"We are expected to operate like a business, but Congress has not allowed us the flexibility to operate like a business," said Postal Service Board of Governors Chairman Mickey D. Barnett on my TV show. It's all "part of being a quasi-governmental entity. That's how the cookie crumbles." Barnett added that the post office has "union contracts that have no layoff provisions."
Reality is at odds with the proud claim on the post office's website that "Since Ben Franklin ... the Postal Service has grown and changed with America." But it's barely changed. You don't tend to see change in "quasi-governmental entities." You see stagnation.
This year the post office tried to limit Saturday delivery to save money. But Congress forbade the change. The politicians' constituents like getting their mail six days a week.
"They don't want a cut in Saturday delivery," Rep. Alan Grayson, D-Fla., told me.
"The USPS does need reform," Rep. Sam Graves, R-Mo., told the Kansas City Star. "However, reducing core services is not a long-term plan. I worry that reducing services will lead to other reductions like closing rural post offices."
But the post office should do both. The government maintains hundreds of tiny local post offices, each of which brings in less than $700 a month. Running those offices costs much more than that. Some are just one mile away from other post offices.
People like "universal service," which has been taken to mean that every American must get mail service, no matter how deep in the boondocks they live. The post office even hauls mail by mule to the bottom of the Grand Canyon.
"The post office provides something that's extremely valuable and has to be maintained, and that's universal service," Grayson told me. "There are countries a lot poorer than the United States, including the Congo ... that try to provide universal mail service to everybody. ... People don't want post offices closed!"
On the floor of Congress, Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., proclaimed that universal service is required, saying, "It's in the Constitution."
But it's not. The Constitution says, "Congress shall have the Power To ... establish Post Offices." But it doesn't have to use that power.
Cato Institute budget analyst Tad DeHaven argues, "People living in rural America aren't living there by force. ... Go back to history. Private carriers picked up the mail from the post office and took it the last mile, or people came to the post office and picked it up."
And private alternatives are much better today. We have e-mail. UPS delivers 300 packages a minute and makes a profit. Federal Express, UPS and others thrive by finding new ways to cut costs. They don't do it because they were born nicer people. They do it because of the pressure of competition. They make money -- while the post office loses $16 billion.
Why not just privatize it? No more special government protections, no limit on competitors offering similar services.
Then mail service would be even better than before. The market delivers.
I think you are on to something. For decades the letter to Boise or Fairbanks could go at the same rate because they knew each of us would be spending at least a dozen stamps locally each month when we paid the light bill, water bill, etc. Now that that’s all gone online it’s kicked the legs out from under their subsidy.
They could do better, but of course Congress (not even the supposedly stingy Republicans) will let them.
Comparing them to FedEX or USPS which wouldn't make a profit mailing letters to Searchlight, NV at under $1 a pop is a category mistake.
Gub’mnt pays for its own use of postage, and for franking, and they pay for free for the blind and handicapped mail.
I'll have to disagree there. Anyone who ever has a little time in DC should take a short walk to the postal museum near the Amtrak Station.
It was a model of efficiency post World War II. A letter could get from Maine to California in 2-3 days tops traveling in trains which seldom went over 30 mph. For three cents, or about two-thirds of what it costs today adjusted for inflation.
There was a mail car on this train where a mere 1-2 workers furiously sorted mail en route, leaving a bag at the next station or junction which was bound for a destination in different directions than where the train was heading. Then the worker or workers would get back on a train heading in the opposite direction for the second half of their shift and were back where they started when the shift ended. On main lines, where trains ran through the night, a relief crew was ready to take over 24/7. On the secondaries, there were relief crews for only as long as the train ran, typically 12 or 16 hours.
Where trains didn't make regular runs, buses connected the train routes to perform the same function. If you are as old as I am and still fortunate enough to have parents or grandparents who lived during this time, they will confirm it. My mother, who lived in the west, and her sister, who was working in the east, have penny postcards and replies typically postmarked 3-4 days apart to prove it.
It was an absolute marvel of precision and efficiency with 1940s technology. Of course, postal workers were not unionized and only got a wage and benefit package slightly better than their counterparts in private industry in those days.
I once made the mistake of ordering packets of 25 when I was ordering individual boxes/padded envelopes. Our company has enough in the mail room to last us the next three years (at least) as a result. I'll do anything I can to avoid standing in line at the post office. It is even worth the couple of bucks to avoid it when I need stamps.
Five post offices and yet the Post Office can’t bring itself to make home delivery? That’s an efficiently run service for ya. (Actually there’s one post office on Market Street).
Article I, Section 8, Clause 7 of the United States Constitution, known as the Postal Clause or the Postal Power, empowers Congress “To establish Post Offices and post Roads”.
Everybody wants to get rid of the USPS, but its establishment is in the Constitution.
The USPS is an easy target, because it is the most recognizable part of the federal government in every city and neighborhood. It still moves an amazing amount of mail (Fed Ex and UPS deliver only a tiny fraction what the USPS delivers daily). If you look at its losses over the past 5 years, it is minuscule to the trillions of dollars of debt from far, far more wasteful and destructive divisions of the government.
Oh Boo Hoo...I guess we should give them fat pensions they don’t deserve into perpetuity on the tax payer!
The USPS is just another part of the DNC Mafia skimming tax dollars off the top for unions that give it back in contibutions.
To hell with the post office!
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