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U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

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Re: U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

#131

Post by voz_ »

throwaway185205 wrote: post #89
voz_ wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Throw-away accounts with no identifying information, purposely flaming comments that add nothing to the discussion (nevermind with no citation, sources, or data) are a very non-hn thing. Is there a rule against this kind of low quality participation?

I'm directly refuting a substance-free political assertion ("flame"). You're sea-lioning.

Your negative karma indicates that most people disagree. Please come back with a real account and let us have a healthy debate. This is an interesting topic and is worth discussion.

Re: U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

#132

Post by artimaeis »

crankylinuxuser wrote: post #123
dantheman wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an idea that's past it's prime. Weekly delivery is all anyone needs, it's all junk mail anyway

Spoken like a cityfolk. In the more rural parts, mail is very important. Cutting it down to 1/week is terrible.

It's simple to establish that rural delivery has a higher cost to the USPS than city delivery does. As you've pointed out, cutting delivery days to rural citizens also bears a high cost in the view of those with diminished service.

It seems the exceedingly sensible thing to do would simply be for the government to subsidize delivery to the costliest areas. Unfortunately that would mean taxpayer dollars supporting the USPS and that's an idea that's seemingly untenable to rural communities.

Hopefully a solution can be found in all of this. I certainly can't see one, but I'm hopeful that it'll find a way.

Re: U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

#133

Post by ezrast »

sio8ohPi wrote: post #116
burkaman wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine a world where state or federal government wants to do mail-in voting, or conduct a census, or mail emergency checks to all Americans, or send out tax refunds, or passports, or birth certificates, and private companies refuse to do it, or charge exorbitant rates. Would you prefer: a) The government can compel private companies to do any of these things at any time whether they want to or not. b) The government…

As I said, I understand the utility of services like certified mail. That seems like the appropriate level of care for most of the mailings you mention. You wouldn't want absentee ballots or passports to be lost, right? Or if my county wants to summon me for jury duty, they probably should pay the $3 to make sure I get the summons. At heart, though, my beef with USPS stems from my hatred of spam. They're a service I…

HN has this conversation about web services all the time. "I'm tired of seeing ads" -> "Somebody has to pay server costs, would you prefer all content be paywalled?" -> "Someone should implement a micropayment system so we can all support these things collectively."

Only here we already have the centralized payment system in the form of taxes, but it turns out when you use that to subsidize USPS operations everyone still complains.

Re: U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

#134

Post by ken »

nerevarthelame wrote: post #30
curiousgeorgio wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The USPS is a crucial part of the US infrastructure. Mail delivery and shipping are crucial, not the USPS. There are plenty of other private companies that can and do show the ability to do what the USPS does - only more efficiently (and without consistently losing money). At this point in history, there's no need for us to continue supporting the tax-subsidized[1] money pit that is the USPS. Yet another piece of e…

What private companies are delivering mail to rural areas in the middle of Montana? And how much do you think they charge to deliver a single letter to someone an hour away? (Answers: No one - they contract the work to the USPS, and at least $10 per letter)

But why do we need to deliver paper letters?

As ezrast says below, the real goal is a "reliable communications network", which I agree with wholeheartedly. In the 18th century, that was spelled "Post Offices and Post Roads". They couldn't have anticipated email. Must we interpret the Constitution's requirement so literally?

Maybe "post offices and post roads" could mean "internet service". We're seeing public school taught over the internet today, due to COVID-19, so I think it's fair to call the internet an essential service. That's how I receive 99% of my communications. Does even rural Montana really find it more valuable to send pieces of paper than internet packets?

Let's stop printing 100 million advertisements every day just to drive them across the country and throw them away somewhere else. Instead, let's use the office to provide internet access to everyone. I think that would be exactly in line with the spirit of the Constitution.

Re: U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

#135

Post by cactus2093 »

Spooky23 wrote: post #104
cactus2093 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This doesn't seem to be a common opinion, but I generally don't understand why USPS is critical infrastructure. Vote by mail is just about the only essential service they provide that I can think of, and that could potentially still be supported in other ways without USPS the other 364 days of the year. Many of the justifications I've come across of why mail is essential seem to center around transmission of informat…

You shouldn't be downvoted... you're expressing valid questions that should be understood. With issues like mail, voter-id, etc you really need to remember that there are 300+ million people in the United States, and most of the others that you know are like you. You gotta walk a mile in others' shoes. I come from a place in rural upstate NY where broadband is only available to about 75% of the population, the legacy…

Genuine question - how available is home phone service and DSL internet in that area? Email, and ability to load some official websites is the critical service, which doesn't need to be that fast.

> Should my ability to keep my home be contingent on my phone service?

No, ideally not just on phone service. But on something digital that is free and doesn't require any effort to keep it live over an extended period of time (perhaps email). This kind of thing is exactly my point though, should your ability to participate in society be contingent on living in one place for a prolonged period of time? When I was younger I knew a lot of people that would bum around for a while, travel, crash on friends couches, etc. I remember multiple friends who had a relatively small bill get sent to collections and ruin their credit for the next 7 years because the service had an old address on file. It seems crazy to me that this can happen, that you'd just be sent a few pieces of paper of which it can never be verified that you've actually received them, and no one ever needs to make an effort to call or email you, and then that ruins your credit. And these people were relatively well off and overall pretty responsible in the scheme of things, I can only imagine this type of thing must also screw over chronically poor people all the time.

> killing it in the middle of a crisis for stupid political reasons is not a strategy

100% agree with that, I've just wondered a for a long time why so many official things still done primarily through mail. In my opinion it's worth at least having a public discussion about why things are even still done this way, and therefore whether we still actually need the USPS. But it seems that even on this tech website most people don't agree.

I do appreciate your comment, ultimately it seems like these arguments fall along a very stark a rural/urban divide. I'm so used to living in cities that it's just ingrained in my mind that housing and something like a physical address is a premium and scarce resource and anything digital can be much more freely available and unconstrained. It's hard to even fathom that in some people's reality it is the opposite (and even after reading your arguments, I'm still skeptical to what extent that is the case).

Re: U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

#136

Post by burkaman »

sio8ohPi wrote: post #116
burkaman wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine a world where state or federal government wants to do mail-in voting, or conduct a census, or mail emergency checks to all Americans, or send out tax refunds, or passports, or birth certificates, and private companies refuse to do it, or charge exorbitant rates. Would you prefer: a) The government can compel private companies to do any of these things at any time whether they want to or not. b) The government…

As I said, I understand the utility of services like certified mail. That seems like the appropriate level of care for most of the mailings you mention. You wouldn't want absentee ballots or passports to be lost, right? Or if my county wants to summon me for jury duty, they probably should pay the $3 to make sure I get the summons. At heart, though, my beef with USPS stems from my hatred of spam. They're a service I…

Nobody likes marketing mail. If you think you know how to convince Congress to let the postal service operate like a normal government service and stop trying to make a profit, let me know how I can help.

Re: U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

#137

Post by voz_ »

dantheman wrote: post #92
eezurr wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add to the ongoing list, the USPS is the only delivery service that cannot open up your mail/packages without a warrant.

The USPS has been secretly recording to and from information and handing it over to feds for decades.

Seems unsubstantiated. Proof? Would love to learn more here.

Re: U.S. Postal Workers Were on the Front Lines Before. They Were Ignored

#138

Post by ohyeshedid »

voz_ wrote: post #137
dantheman wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The USPS has been secretly recording to and from information and handing it over to feds for decades.

Seems unsubstantiated. Proof? Would love to learn more here.

It's not some secretive process.[1]

[1] https://informeddelivery.usps.com/box/pages/intro/start.acti...

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