> The USPS lost $2.7B last year, why anyone would want to give it more responsibility is beyond me.

The loss comes from having to serve literally the entire country by law. A postal service in cities is profitable - a postal service that has to serve even the remotest ditch in the deepest desert of a flyover state with daily mail will always incur loss. And that is what society is for: to bear the cost of providing everyone in the country with affordable mail.

To add banking services to the unbanked (or those who do not trust the megabanks any more, given their historic lack of customer support and historically low image) is something that can very well be used to offset these losses.