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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.”

#81

Post by aasarava »

anamax wrote: post #68
jonknee wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No need to handle the spam, simply stop subsidizing it with a bulk mail discount. If they continue to send then the financial troubles are solved.

> No need to handle the spam, simply stop subsidizing it with a bulk mail discount. The USPS claims that bulk mail more than pays its way. In fact, there's a federal law requiring that. Yes, bulk mail does pay a lower rate. However, it must obey certain constraints which the USPS claims result in significantly lower costs. In other words, bulk mail is supposedly profitable even though they charge less for it. If you'…

Correct. Most bulk mail must arrive at the post office presorted, which saves the USPS from having to do it.

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

#82

Post by dustingetz »

hnal943 wrote: post #55
sachinag wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is the mandatory requirements for full service in unprofitable areas. The USPS literally has a plane that goes weekly to the most isolated part of Idaho: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/30/us/30idaho.html There's no way a private contractor could/would do that.

They certainly would. Just not for 44 cents.

yep, part of the cost of living in isolation.

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

#83

Post by dhume »

roboneal wrote: post #46
jonknee wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying it's a bad deal, just that the OP hadn't actually bought a stamp in a long time (or at least realized the cost).

15% price increase (39 to 44 cents) in 4 years is not unnoticed "in volume" and easily outstrips inflation.

You can cherry-pick intervals where stamp prices outstripped inflation, and I can cherry-pick intervals where stamp prices stayed well below inflation.

A 12.8% increase (not sure how you came up with 15%) over a period where inflation was only around 7.8% (based on month-to-month consumer price index report) sounds pretty bad, but you seem to have missed the previous four years, where inflation was 10.1% and the price only went up 5.4%. For the interval between raising to 37¢ and raising to 44¢ (an 18.9% increase), inflation totaled 18.7%. If a difference of 0.2 points makes all that much difference, you probably shouldn't be using the first class rate anyway.

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

#84

Post by tsally »

hnal943 wrote: post #63
tsally wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time the US postal service comes up in discussion, someone invariably mentions how life would be so much better if the service was privatized. I think this argument represents a fundamental misunderstanding of public services; the post office is perhaps the canonical example of an extremely important service that only can exist in the public sector. As others have mentioned already ( http://news.ycombinator.com…

The essential service here is mail delivery, not mail delivery "under a dollar."

No, the essential service is mail delivery under a dollar to anywhere in the United States. That is a fundamentally different service than what is provided by Fedex or UPS.

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

#85

Post by tsally »

roboneal wrote: post #76
tsally wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time the US postal service comes up in discussion, someone invariably mentions how life would be so much better if the service was privatized. I think this argument represents a fundamental misunderstanding of public services; the post office is perhaps the canonical example of an extremely important service that only can exist in the public sector. As others have mentioned already ( http://news.ycombinator.com…

With the dramatic drop in mail volumes, hasn't the market (businesses and citizens alike) "voted" that traditional first-class letter (USPS only monopoly) is not a "fundamental component" of our society? If we haven't quite reached that point yet, can't you see we will?

With the dramatic drop in mail volumes, hasn't the market (businesses and citizens alike) "voted" that traditional first-class letter (USPS only monopoly) is not a "fundamental component" of our society?

No, mail is not the fundamental component I've identified. As I said, the fundamental component is: "the ability to affordability correspond with others around the country".

If we haven't quite reached that point yet, can't you see we will?

Oh, we'll get there. I think it's high time the USPS started providing free email accounts to every United States citizen with no advertisements. The USPS can provide privacy guarantees for the data on their servers that private companies cannot offer. Plus, imagine the optimizations that would be possible in business and government methodologies if every US citizen was guaranteed to have an email address. Hell, in this day and age I'm far less likely to change my email address than my mailing address. If I had a government issued email, it would never change.

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

#86

Post by bretpiatt »

sachinag wrote: post #42
jasonlbaptiste wrote: post #39

Privatize the system and outsource it to UPS/FedEX,etc. (I know easier said than done). If I ever need to send snail mail, I just send it via those guys.

The problem is the mandatory requirements for full service in unprofitable areas. The USPS literally has a plane that goes weekly to the most isolated part of Idaho: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/30/us/30idaho.html There's no way a private contractor could/would do that.

A private contractor would be happy to do that for a profitable price. Postage at a flat fee subsidizes some customers at the expense of others. If you want to send mail to the remote part of Idaho get ready for a very infrequent delivery or a high charge.

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

#87

Post by aasarava »

dpcan wrote: post #78

Why can't I get/pay for a USPS.com email address of my physical address? 123MainSt.MyCity.State.Zip@usps.com? Anything that is emailed to this address must pay postage, but the message body or attachment can be printed, certified and delivered to my physical location? Maybe this isn't the perfect idea, but if the USPS would just embrace technology and innovate a little, they could really increase their revenues.

Agreed. The late 90s really presented an opportunity to the USPS, in that the postal service could have launched an ISP service to profit off the mail that was beginning to be sent online.

Today, most of the companies that send me bills or statements encourage me to get e-statements instead of paper statements, which saves the companies money -- money that used to go to USPS. If the postal service had innovated and come up with smart business solutions for sending secure, certified email to customers, they'd still be capturing that money (and possibly more.)

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

#88

Post by ibsulon »

jonknee wrote: post #53
tsally wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the current solution for snail mail spam is the optimal one. Consider the two possibilities: (1) the government raises taxes in order to increase the USPS's ability to handle spam or (2) the USPS offloads the majority of the filtering process to the recipients (the current solution). On days I receive spam in the mail, I waste approximately one second when I have to pause to throw it away. If the USPS were to…

No need to handle the spam, simply stop subsidizing it with a bulk mail discount. If they continue to send then the financial troubles are solved.

The problem is that bulk mail subsidizes the rest of the system. Now, you might say, then the system is flawed and perhaps a private solution would be better!

The problem is that the post office exists mostly because most rural mail costs more to deliver than the price. It is in the government's interest to make sure that it can send and receive mail to and from all pieces of the country (for taxes, the census, and for general commerce for rural areas. )

As such, bulk mail is a subsidy.

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

#89

Post by tsally »

juhgfcgvhnjm wrote: post #52
tsally wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time the US postal service comes up in discussion, someone invariably mentions how life would be so much better if the service was privatized. I think this argument represents a fundamental misunderstanding of public services; the post office is perhaps the canonical example of an extremely important service that only can exist in the public sector. As others have mentioned already ( http://news.ycombinator.com…

Then give Fedex/TNT/DHL/etc the same subsidy/letter to do it that you give the USPS.

Yes, because that strategy has worked so well with cable and broadband providers. I have a heck of a lot more faith in the USPS than Comcast.

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

#90

Post by darragjm »

tsally wrote: post #44
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.

I think the current solution for snail mail spam is the optimal one. Consider the two possibilities: (1) the government raises taxes in order to increase the USPS's ability to handle spam or (2) the USPS offloads the majority of the filtering process to the recipients (the current solution). On days I receive spam in the mail, I waste approximately one second when I have to pause to throw it away. If the USPS were to…

I doubt taxes would be raised for that since the USPS is a quasi-independent "federal corporation" and therefore doesn't use tax dollars to sustain itself.
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