What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean? • Hacker News Board

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#71

Post by eru » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:10 AM UTC

owenthejumper wrote: post #18

eru wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The USPS is a no-brainer public service and the only reason there is any question of its value is due to the severely broken, dysfunctional, corrupt Congress. Huh? Even Germany managed to privatise their snail mail, and approximately no one would want to renationalise it. What makes USPS a 'no-brainer public service'? What's the big benefit of having government snail mail? Mail delivery service is not a public good…

For one, Germany is a densely populated country smaller than the state of California. I think we can stop there? There is really almost no comparison to the US in terms of rural areas anywhere in Europe.

Just split the US into 50 individual territories, if you think that being small is a benefit in service provision.

> There is really almost no comparison to the US in terms of rural areas anywhere in Europe.

Why do rural people deserve subsidies by virtue of living in the sticks?

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#72

Post by eru » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:10 AM UTC

thayne wrote: post #53

eru wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The USPS is a no-brainer public service and the only reason there is any question of its value is due to the severely broken, dysfunctional, corrupt Congress. Huh? Even Germany managed to privatise their snail mail, and approximately no one would want to renationalise it. What makes USPS a 'no-brainer public service'? What's the big benefit of having government snail mail? Mail delivery service is not a public good…

Post is a natural monopoly, at a national scale. It is much more efficient to have a single centralized service doing all mail delivery than several competing services doing the same. It isn't completely non-rivalrous, but the marginal cost of delivering a parcel diminishes as the number of parcels delivered in an area goes up.

> Post is a natural monopoly, at a national scale.

It evidently is not. There's multiple providers.

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#73

Post by eru » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:12 AM UTC

notnaut wrote: post #10

eru wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The USPS is a no-brainer public service and the only reason there is any question of its value is due to the severely broken, dysfunctional, corrupt Congress. Huh? Even Germany managed to privatise their snail mail, and approximately no one would want to renationalise it. What makes USPS a 'no-brainer public service'? What's the big benefit of having government snail mail? Mail delivery service is not a public good…

If the USPS were fully privatized without strict government subsidies or mandates, rural and remote Americans would likely face exorbitant delivery surcharges or lose service entirely. Once again… the United States is very large.

> [...] rural and remote Americans would likely face exorbitant delivery surcharges [...]

Surfacing the cost of service provision to end users is generally a good tool to align incentives.

(Use welfare systems to give money to poor people. But don't worry about giving rich people support just because they are old or live in the sticks.)

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#74

Post by bulbar » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:16 AM UTC

comrade1234 wrote: post #21

eru wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh, where's the postal service in the constitution? As far as I can tell your constitution allows the federal level to regulate postal services, but it does not require the establishment of government snail mail.

"The Congress shall have Power...To establish Post Offices and post Roads;" The wording "shall" is what I meant by weird wording. But no roads? No post offices? Whatever. The constitution is extremely flawed and should be abandoned.

"Just build it from scratch, can't be that hard" - every software engineer at some point in the past.

It is that hard and even harder. An then you have the problem that politicians and societies have a hard time to decide on topics of much narrower scope and much smaller impact.

That said, I would love to for the US having a solid checks and balances system instead of the current system.

If you want to look at a case study regarding a 'more modern' constitution: the German (de facto) constitution is only around 80 years old.

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#75

Post by eru » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:20 AM UTC

garbagewoman wrote: post #13

eru wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The USPS is a no-brainer public service and the only reason there is any question of its value is due to the severely broken, dysfunctional, corrupt Congress. Huh? Even Germany managed to privatise their snail mail, and approximately no one would want to renationalise it. What makes USPS a 'no-brainer public service'? What's the big benefit of having government snail mail? Mail delivery service is not a public good…

What were the benefits to germany?

Lower prices, bigger volume in the market. And the privatised Deutsche Post (/ DHL) is now a world beating logistics company that makes plenty of profit, instead of subsidies and bleeding red ink all over.

However Germany still has plenty of government interference in snail mail, like a universal service mandate (or a sector specific minimum wage).

Denmark dropped that requirement, and Danish society hasn't collapsed so far.

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#76

Post by bulbar » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:20 AM UTC

Supermancho wrote: post #5

It's a casualty of political corruption, both moral in terms of Party first politics and run-of-the-mill crony capitalism. That's what it means. The consequences are far reaching for many existing industries. It may never be unraveled once initiated. It will give rise to more concentrated wealth and power. This is by design.

And the current situation, having a billionaire running the country, is fully intentional by a major part of the society.

Want to get rid of corruption? - Vote a representative of the source of that corruption (aka billionaires) into power... sorry, WHAT?

Billionaire is keen to make billionaire-friendly politics. A surprising headline? Apparently.

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#77

Post by bulbar » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:26 AM UTC

charcircuit wrote: post #30

>much of what USPS does is unprofitable The same could be said about many organizations within companies if you don't give them a proper budget. Once you start actually caring about being profitable it turns out that you can find how to do things in a way that is less wasteful. Cost acts as an incentive to reduce waste and if you remove it then there is no force to combat waste or unsustainable practices. >It’s not t…

Yeah, of course they can/could, it's just that it does not make sense from an economic point of view. Which directly circles back to the beginning "USPS is not profitable".

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#78

Post by burnt-resistor » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:32 AM UTC

cobertos wrote: post #14

Doesn't USPS also play a key role in a lot of other services? * ID verification * Vacant home notifications * Registered mail I have a hard time seeing a private company scrupulously handling these operations when the incentives to manipulate them could be very large.

And general delivery*, media mail**, passports, money orders, stamps, and collectables. Furthermore, nation-state post offices should provide free basic banking services to everyone to eliminate unbanked status.

* Delivery to a post office for an individual without a delivery address

** Low cost media shipping excluding comic books, games, and magazines containing advertisements

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#79

Post by burnt-resistor » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:33 AM UTC

Grombobulous wrote: post #59

cobertos wrote: post #14

Doesn't USPS also play a key role in a lot of other services? * ID verification * Vacant home notifications * Registered mail I have a hard time seeing a private company scrupulously handling these operations when the incentives to manipulate them could be very large.

I still think the USPS banking idea would be a really great one. Easier profit than a regular bank because the “branches” already have to exist, closes banking gaps for underserved populations, perhaps some other benefits I haven’t even considered.

It shouldn't be done for-profit, it should be equivalent to a credit union open to all.

Re: What does privatization of the US Postal Service mean?

#80

Post by Grombobulous » Sat, Jul 04, 2026, 4:34 AM UTC

eru wrote: post #66

Grombobulous wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Refusing service entirely kinda feels like more like something that fits the word “discrimination.” UPS/FedEx can refuse service to you for almost any reason. But, perhaps you’re right, maybe the word “discrimination” is the wrong word. Either way, from a national policy standpoint there are very good reasons to subsidize rural areas for basic infrastructure services like mail and internet. USPS from an operations st…

You can auction off the universal service obligation to willing bidders without having a state owned enterprise with a government monopoly. > Either way, from a national policy standpoint there are very good reasons to subsidize rural areas for basic infrastructure services like mail and internet. Please tell me a few.

Sure!

Rural areas extract and produce many resources that urban areas depend on. Agriculture, fishing, oil, gas, uranium, wood, maple syrup, etc.

You can’t get workforces to live in those places or businesses to operate there if there’s no roads, internet, mail, schools, hospitals, etc (or if those things are prohibitively expensive).

Don’t forget that subsidy doesn’t always mean the difference between whether it’s expensive or not, it can also mean the difference between having and not having.

Another reason is that too much regional wealth inequality can be bad for national stability. It can lead to things like civil wars and unrest.