The United States Postal Service is an integral part of American history and a crucial to citizen day to day lives. The USPS as we know it today was founded in 1971, but the organization has been around since the Second Continental Congress in 1775, making it older than the United States.
The Postal Service has survived this long by adapting to every new thing thrown at. Need to mail nationally? Trains. Internationally? Boats. Rurally? The Pony Express. Even surviving the threat of technology and e-mail, the Post Office has always survived. But for how much longer can it keep going at this pace?
Currently, the USPS is $160 billion dollars in debt according to Business Insider. To answer the question of how iit got this bad, we have to travel back in time, to the passing of The Postal Reorganization Act of 1970. This law deregulated the postal service, making it no longer part of the president’s cabinet but its own independent federal agency. This meant it was no longer funded by taxes or direct governmental subsidies. It essentially became a corporation with an official monopoly on the delivery of US mail. At the time this was a great change and allowed the USPS to flourish like never before. At times, it made profits in the billions, until the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act (PAEA) of 2006.
This essentially bankrupted the USPS, almost immediately turning profits into debt. It did this by restructuring the retirement plan, limiting the ability to set prices, and asking it to estimate a future healthcare and pension cost for the next 75 years. While the USPS has informed congress numerous times about the issues it faces, it has fallen on deaf ears. This flawed system, on top of the loss the pandemic has caused leaves the country and the USPS in the predicament it is today. So the follow-up question is why keep the USPS around if it has become such a burden?
A large part of that answer is the people. The USPS is made up of thousands U.S. citizens that are public servants and foundational members of their communities. Dismantling the Postal Service would leave millions without jobs that would then turn to similarly underfunded social programs. We also need the USPS to keep mail costs low. Without the USPS private corporations like UPS or FedEx wouldn’t have to compete with the low costs of mailing through the USPS and could skyrocket costs. Also, all the large mailing corporations combined could not handle the volume and expanse of mail the USPS does. The American people would find themselves at a loss for efficient mail carriers.
Right now we need a secure and speedy service to handle the high volume of mail-in ballots the country will have this fall. Along with the many other aspects of life, the pandemic has changed, voting is one of the biggest. Rather than voting in person, all citizens have been highly encouraged to vote by mail to stop the spread of COVID. We need the USPS at full health to handle this momentous task. So how can we help revive the Postal Service? Buy stamps. Sign petitions. Send your friend a large care package. Anything from buying one stamp to mailing a 1,000 boxes helps. So mail your best friend a letter, just ‘cus.