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“There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

usps.com

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Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#101

Post by cjoh »

kscaldef wrote: post #92
cjoh wrote: post #66

Amazing stats in their footer: With 36,000 retail locations and the most frequently visited website in the federal government, the Postal Service relies on the sale of postage, products and services to pay for operating expenses. Named the Most Trusted Government Agency five consecutive years and the sixth Most Trusted Business in the nation by the Ponemon Institute, the Postal Service has annual revenue of more than…

Keep in mind that they also have a government-granted monopoly. They probably wouldn't be a big otherwise.

Maybe-- but that's a tough conclusion. While the USPS is a government agency, we still don't have enough data about the agency, or any agency's efficiency to be an accurate judge. It'd be great, for instance, if we could see what the average price per employee at the USPS was vs. UPS vs. FedEx. Sick leave comparisons, purchasing efficiencies, etc.

Lots of this data isn't available though (which is why I have my job)

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#102

Post by rationalbeaver »

leelin wrote: post #80

Isn't their logic confusing latency and throughput? Not enough mail to deliver suggests less mail volume, so less need for throughput, therefore we can hire fewer postal workers per post office. Cutting out one day of deliveries reduces throughput and increases latency. For example, Netflix becomes a worse deal. A power user could once cycle 2 roundtrips of DVDs in one week and is now down to 1.5.

It's hard to address throughput that way when the Throughputers are in a union.

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#103

Post by Retric »

_delirium wrote: post #94
dantheman wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think anyone is saying they don't make money off of spam, just that they shouldn't be encouraging it. If spammers had to pay full price perhaps we'd see less of it, or if not then the postal service would make more money.

If there were no bulk-mail discount, though, there'd be no way to get them to follow the USPS's constraints. The discount is what gets them to presort their mail, put bar codes on it, etc.

I think most people would be fine if there was a 5% discount for bulk mail, however they cut it way more than that.

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#104

Post by thrill »

muerdeme wrote: post #33

I saw the chairman of their board speak not long ago, and it turns out the biggest problem is that USPS can't fire any of their union employees, who consistently get awarded UPS salaries + 15-20% in arbitration.

The extension of this idea is that we'll eventually have a company of 600,000 employees who only do their actual job - delivering mail - one day a week.

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#105

Post by mrj »

pxlpshr wrote: post #19
hyperbovine wrote: post #12

The real loser here is netflix. 17% increase in delivery time and not a damn thing you can do about it. Ouch.

Not really, I see mail as a temporary problem. If Netflix Streaming contained all the top titles, I would use that almost exclusively. There really would be no reason for mail, it's slow and inefficient.

If they supported closed captioning, that would be more of an option for all of us.

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#106

Post by cookiecaper »

ryanelkins wrote: post #99
jonknee wrote: post #9

> Ten years ago, the average household received five pieces of mail every day. Today, it receives four pieces and by 2020, that number will fall to three. ... And it would receive much less than that if the USPS wasn't mostly a delivery network for spam.

Here is what I hate about the USPS and spam. I opened a PO Box to receive rental payments on some properties I owned. The only people who got this address were tenants. It wasn't used for anything else. I'd check it once a month and it would be crammed full of ads. By crammed I mean seriously tightly wedged full of junk. I'd have to pick through it all to try and find my rent checks and not throw them out with the ad…

I'm pretty sure they just pay the Post Office to put ads in every PO Box there.

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#107

Post by jrockway »

funkdobiest wrote: post #97
jrockway wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's nice about mailing physical media is that the movie studios don't have much control. You can buy a widget and do whatever you want with it, including mailing it around. You can't do this on the Internet, though, because computers are magical and Someone Could Copy It!1111!!

you would think they would catch on that physical media is easily copyable where the instant downloads aren't so why not do instant for everything first then DVD.

If someone knew the answer to this question, the movie industry wouldn't be driving itself out of business.

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#108

Post by jrockway »

orblivion wrote: post #72
jrockway wrote: post #34

Hopefully UPS and FedEx will make up the difference by delivering on Sunday. The only stuff I get in the mail these days is some envelope warning me that I will go to jail if I don't tell the government my phone number.

If the USPS would make it legal to deliver small pieces of mail.

Do you receive small pieces of mail?

Personally, all my bills come online. If I lose my credit card, I get it via FedEx or UPS. When I order some physical goods, it's a package (so "small piece" is not relevant).

Basically, there is not much value is sending small pieces of mail anymore. I just want to order stuff from Amazon on Friday and have it on Sunday :)

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#109

Post by jrockway »

ryanelkins wrote: post #99
jonknee wrote: post #9

> Ten years ago, the average household received five pieces of mail every day. Today, it receives four pieces and by 2020, that number will fall to three. ... And it would receive much less than that if the USPS wasn't mostly a delivery network for spam.

Here is what I hate about the USPS and spam. I opened a PO Box to receive rental payments on some properties I owned. The only people who got this address were tenants. It wasn't used for anything else. I'd check it once a month and it would be crammed full of ads. By crammed I mean seriously tightly wedged full of junk. I'd have to pick through it all to try and find my rent checks and not throw them out with the ad…

This happens to me, too. I am sure I've lost important mail because it got mixed in with the crapmail. (OK, I probably don't get any important mail. But still, it worries me a little.)

I guess this isn't as bad as people that break into my building and shove their ads under my door. That really annoys me.

Re: “There is no longer enough mail to sustain six days of delivery.”

#110

Post by smokey_the_bear »

Maybe if this went through I could have home USPS delivery. The town I live in apparently adds enough new addresses to add two routes a year, but they can't hire that quickly. So half the residents have to use a PO Box for their address, and stuff shipped to their physical address gets returned.

Even one a day a week home delivery would be better for me. Stuff is rarely time sensitive, and we don't make it to the PO Box that often anyway.

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