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"If you think about the USPS as an independent corporation, it would be crazy to think about these results..."

I agree. But why should we think of it that way?

The Postal Service was originally conceived as an essential piece of national infrastructure. Why should we think of it as an "independent" entity that needs to turn a profit? Does the highway system turn a profit? How about the Federal Reserve, or the National Institutes of Health?

What's important is that the USPS continue to have enough funding to provide its service in an accessible, timely, and reliable manner. That is what makes it a critical piece of infrastructure. Like it or not, it is still essential to be able to communicate with hard copies.

(Why? For one thing, we don't, as citizens, all have an official electronic mail box. Physical mail also bears information about its transport -- where it went, whether anyone else read it along the way, whether it was delivered and read -- in a way that most electronic communication doesn't. We don't have a unified way of finding out how to communicate with someone online, and the means we do have are all owned by private corporations that cannot be relied on to provide that information in perpetuity. And so on.)

I agree that, for many things, there are ways to communicate that have advantages the Postal Service doesn't offer. But I cannot imagine having to sacrifice what makes that service valuable in the name of making it profitable, or always having to rely on alternative services, especially for critical or official communication. We're going to need a public post office for some time yet. And as communication continues to move online, the need for a reliable, public system for delivering that communication will grow even further.

For one thing, we don't, as citizens, all have an official electronic mail box.

A $8.5 billion subsidy to cover this last year's losses could have bought 20 million Americans iPads/netbooks.

If we're going to subsidize universal service, let's do it in a modern fashion. And let's focus on those people and regions that would get left out otherwise. There's no need to federalize things everywhere -- including in cities where competing alternatives would be eager to operate -- to cover a few edge cases for poor and rural delivery.

A $8.5 billion subsidy to cover this last year's losses could have bought 20 million Americans iPads/netbooks.

What, exactly, would that achieve? Not the same function that the USPS does. Sure, 20 million more people would have a device, but they wouldn't have a "U.S. Email address" in the same way that they have a "U.S. Mail address". They would just have a way to use someone else's privately-owned infrastructure. Who knows how long that would last, or how reliable it would be?

If we're going to subsidize universal service, let's do it in a modern fashion.

I agree. But that means what we should be doing is building public infrastructure for new forms of communication, not farming it out to private infrastructure (which decides whether or not to deliver mail, first and foremost, on the basis of whether it is profitable) in order to save a buck. Let's have a national electronic service that:

- provides an "address" [1] to every citizen, with a directory that allows people to find each other

- provides guaranteed, reliable, on-time delivery at minimal cost to the sender

- guarantees secure communications

- provides a channel for official communications, from voting to tax forms to jury duty summons

[1] I'm not sure if "address" is the right metaphor or not. Certainly, a mere "government email address" wouldn't be sufficient. The basic point is that every individual citizen ought to have some sort of secure repository where they can receive communications of all kinds: email, documents, whatever. And it should be at least as easy to access this repository as it is to walk out your door to your mailbox. That means that, if people need a computer and Internet connection to access it, they must be provided with one; their hardware, software, and network connection must work at least as reliably as mail delivery does.

I'd rather not have yet another way for the government to track my every move and communication. I do like the concept of having a single destination for communication, regardless of my location, but I don't want the (US) government involved. What I'd really like is a way to receive physical mail at a single "address" no matter where I am. If I'm traveling, living in a place temporarily for short-term work, studying, whatever, I don't want to have to keep updating my mailing address with companies and a dozen government agencies.

I'd rather not have yet another way for the government to track my every move and communication. I do like the concept of having a single destination for communication, regardless of my location, but I don't want the (US) government involved.

I understand the sentiment here, but I wonder what the alternative is. (Letting Facebook track your every move and communication?) Given that the communication is going to take place over somebody's infrastructure, I'd much rather have whoever controls it be accountable to the public.

It's in the public's interest to have a secure channel for communication (secure from everyone, including government agencies). The government is supposed to be our means of providing things that are in our interest. If it can't do that (or it won't do that without providing a back-door for its own domestic snooping), then we have a much more serious problem: a society which is a democracy in name only. I think this is a problem to be addressed, not an inevitability that we should be resigned to.

What I'd really like is a way to receive physical mail at a single "address" no matter where I am. If I'm traveling, living in a place temporarily for short-term work, studying, whatever, I don't want to have to keep updating my mailing address with companies and a dozen government agencies.

This would be great! It's a different problem, though: we're back in the realm of physical mail, rather than electronic communication.

I've heard of mailbox services that will collect your mail, scan and e-mail it to you, then shred whatever you don't need in physical form. A Google search for "mail scanning service" turned up Earth Class Mail and a few others; I might have to check them out.

Does the Federal Reserve turn a profit?

Yes.

$45 billion in 2009: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01...

Earnings beyond the cost of operations are returned to the US Treasury:

http://www.federalreserve.gov/generalinfo/faq/faqfrs.htm#6

kb

This is interesting -- I didn't know the Federal Reserve was allowed to turn a profit. I guess it makes sense, though. My instinct is: well, that's great! (Proof that a government entity can be run profitably!) But even if it couldn't make a profit, that wouldn't be an argument for not having a central bank, or for making drastic cuts to its operations in order to make it profitable. The point is that we have these institutions because we need them to serve a certain function, whether or not they can do so profitably.

The Fed is not a government entity. It's a private for profit company.

Somebody downvoted you instead of replying. I upvoted, but looks like the Stackoverflow-like algo pg has didn't count my vote. Or the person who downvoted you has a posse.

Anyway, here's a web page with an extract from the US federal court: http://www.healthfreedom.info/Federal_Reserve_Fraud.htm

"Examining the organization and function of the Federal Reserve Banks, and applying the relevant factors, we conclude that the Reserve Banks are not federal instrumentalities for purposes of the FTCA, but are independent, privately-owned and locally controlled corporations." [Lewis vs. U.S., 680 F. 2d 1239, 1241]"

It's essential for anyone to be able to send direct mail to a Rural Route address for $0.20?

If anyone mildly sophisticated wanted to tamper with postal mail it would be trivial to do so. Most important mail these days is sent via Fedex, DHL, and UPS.

The price isn't that important, as long as it's not so high that it excludes people from using the mail system (when's the last time you tried to send a letter via Fedex? I bet it didn't cost $0.20). The important thing is that we have a public system, accessible to everyone, for distributing important communications -- things like absentee ballots, jury summons, tax forms, etc. Any citizen with a stable physical location should be reachable with this system, and it should be controlled by a public entity, not a private one that can decide not to deliver mail if it's not profitable.

Actually, any important letter I have to send is sent with FedEx. They provide fast, predictable delivery, tracking numbers, signature requirement, saturday delivery, etc.

Letters don't cost $0.20 to send via the USPS either, unless you're a bulk marketer who is offered a huge discount to send people garbage. I have tried to opt out of all the unsolicited mail (coupons, flyers, magazines, etc.) and they keep sending it. It all (thankfully) gets recycled but it's a huge waste.

I also don't buy the argument that rural route customers should pay the same price for mail as anyone else. If you live in a rural area you get some benefits (cheaper land) and you should have to pay extra for infrastructure that is not efficiently offered when houses are 3 miles apart.

What's with the frequent anti-rural sentiment on HN? Rural residents depend on the mail far more than anyone else, as they are less likely to have access to alternate services. Extremely isolated locations don't have to-the-door delivery of mail, but a row of mailboxes on the road for all the houses in the area. I doubt it's as unprofitable as you seem to think.

Flat-rate delivery of mail is a necessary social equalizer. It would be entirely unfair to deny rural residents access to communication. In many cases they are the ones growing the food we eat, mining the coal that powers our PCs, etc. In exchange for providing valuable services in places we don't want to live, we should isolate them further?

It's not anti-rural sentiment. I understand the case for subsidizing infrastructure for underserved populations, but I think the postal service does this at too great a cost.

For example:

Every day my mailbox is filled with paper that goes directly into the recycle bin. USPS representatives sell direct marketing services to businesses who send all this junk mail because it's so inexpensive to send.

Imagine if your ISP was affiliated with a spammer. This is effectively what the USPS does and it wastes lots of time, paper, and other resources.

The reason the USPS supports paper spam is simply to help fund its egalitarian mission of delivering mail in spite of too-low prices. The USPS does not pay the cost of recycling the paper or the cost of emptying everyone's mailbox of it every day. These are significant negative externalities.

Instead, why not simply subsidize rural mail by giving residents of rural areas some free stamps every month? It seems that making the rest of us deal with removing unwanted garbage from our mailboxes every day is a horribly inefficient way to achieve the egalitarian objective you cite.

Reduce delivery to 3 days a week. Would anyone complain about this?

Netflix addicts. I might only receive a Netflix 2-3 days a week, but making sure those days line up with 3 days of delivery per week would drop throughput to maybe once a week.

Netflix is seriously the only killer app left for the mail system. Everything else I get is either spam or bad news--before Netflix I only checked once a week.

"2) Reduce delivery to 3 days a week. Would anyone complain about this? How many people even check their mail every single day without fail?"

I check the mail every day, religiously. Going to the mail box, waiting for the street to be clear of traffic, peering in, and returning with the mail brings me immense satisfaction. All this, even though I very rarely get mail addressed to me. I wouldn't complain, I understand the need for cuts, but the loss of my routine would sadden me greatly.

Just pretend you're still getting mail delivered every day.

I'm surprised there is still so much agreement that we need a public monopoly postal service. The creation of FedEx and UPS to compete with the USPS in package delivery was the best thing to ever happen to package delivery.

It's not just operational inefficiencies that are slowly strangling the USPS. There are also factors like Congress' bizarre mandate that the USPS fully prefund their retirement and health benefits programs[1], which is something not required of any other federal entity nor something done by private enterprises. That's a huge portion of the USPS's revenue stream poorly tied up.

[1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06...

Why is that bizarre? It sounds like a very practical way to avoid the sorts of issues that have befallen so many other pension plans. It most certainly should be done by public and private orgs, since we can't trust the mechanisms intended to free the cash b/c they are corrupt (this is one reason GM was bailed out... it looks better than everyone realizing the PBGC was bankrupted by one firm's demise).

>The American Postal Workers' Union says this is a "phony crisis" caused by the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act, which requires the Postal Service to pre-fund retiree health care costs.

>No other government agency - or private business - bears this kind of burden.

>As a result of the pre-funding mandate the USPS begins every fiscal year more than $5 billion in debt. In fact, the act requires the USPS to pre-fund 75 years' worth of retiree health care costs in just 10 years.

>If the pre-funding requirement weren't in place the Postal Service would actually have a $3.7 billion surplus - over $1 billion each year for the past three fiscal years - despite declining mail volume due to increased use of electronic mail and an economy in crisis.

http://www.peoplesworld.org/deficit-hawks-take-aim-at-postal...

Emphasis mine. It's just a generally insane burden that's not getting enough attention.

The act also removed $27B of pension obligations from the postal service's books, and used this and other benefits to smooth the transition away from a "pay-go" pension program. Pay as you go retirement programs are fraudulent because if the firm fails the retirees get nothing.

I don't have a problem with the postal service being in debt or unprofitable, I just don't think the service is needed, and it's troubling to me that there are laws preventing other firms from offering letter delivery services that compete with the USPS.

I think you missed one of the more obvious ways to fix the problem. Allow them to set their own rates, and allow other companies access (Permits, Licenses, whatever) to put letters in your mailbox.

The USPS has no incentive to figure out how to deliver mail better when it is the only game in town.

The USPS has managed to improve service while dealing with a postage rate increasing less than the rate of inflation.

I'm sure its all relative, but if you are talking about customer service, my local USPS always has a line of 30 people waiting to pick up a package that the driver was too lazy to bring to the door (Sometimes they come to the door, sometimes they don't). The counter is also staffed by 1 or two people - out of an available 5 - and there is typically a manager standing idly with his hands in his pockets.

If you are talking about improving service, as in the actual shipping service, you must be talking about their achievement of going from "losing a lot of packages", to "losing less than they used to". I've never understood it. I have NEVER lost a UPS or Fedex package. Yet, it is routine for a USPS package to just go "missing", just ask any big ebay seller.

Its also interesting that you assume prices must always go up to match inflation. If USPS was innovating in the right areas, they could drive down costs and deliver more efficiently.

Also, I just suggested the US government allow other approved companies the ability to put things in your mailbox without going to jail. Never said anything about their service.

> 2) Reduce delivery to 3 days a week. Would anyone complain about this? How many people even check their mail every single day without fail?

If my own sphere of influence, I only know 1 person who _doesn't_ check their mail daily.

I don't think the junk mail that takes up the majority of your inbox costs the price of a stamp to send. Surely bulk mail like that is much, much cheaper.

Very well put - and it'd have the additional bonus of increasing interest in non-physical informational transit (i.e. the internet) for urgent documents (and perhaps even help instantiate a shift away from things such as paper contracts), further aiding growth in the tech sector.

The future of the postal industry lies in the transit of physical goods - if they want to survive, they need to become very efficient at moving parcels and packages, and forget about the fiddly business of letters and bulk mail.