Pun Salad

It’s by now a familiar scene. If you live in a neighborhood that gets rural delivery, you’re used to U.S. Postal Service trucks whizzing by two, three or even more times a day, seven days a week – delivering packages at which this government agency remains an effective competitor to UPS and FedEx.

My experience in the small town of Rollinsford, NH differs from Rooks': I don't see that many USPS trucks, the ones I do see don't whiz, and I don't think I've ever received a package delivery from them.

But (that said), it's true that USPS's package delivery service is a bright spot in its otherwise dreary financial landscape.

And, for free-market fans like me, it's important to point out that it's a segment where it has to compete with fully private firms.

If it’s your mail you’re after, things are a lot less certain. The standard has long been six days of delivery per week, Monday through Saturday. For the last two months I haven’t seen a single week with six deliveries; sometimes there are five, sometimes four.

This is also at odds with my experience. The days I don't get mail are (according to USPS Informed Delivery) the days there's been nothing to deliver. I wonder if that's what Rooks is experiencing?

Well, maybe not…

It’s especially frustrating that despite numerous rate increases – six in just the last four years, from 55 cents to 78 cents, a 42% jump – the most basic measurement, consistent home delivery, has fallen.

The most recent Inspector General report agrees (in heavy bureaucratese): "Challenges implementing major changes to the Postal Service network over the last few years has negatively impacted service performance."

And Mr. Free-Marketeer can't help but point out: this is an area in which USPS has a legal monopoly, shielded from competition.

It’s enough to make one wonder whether we shouldn’t rename the post office the Federal Parcel service, or FedEx, Jr., because it can’t to seem to get [sic] its priorities straight.

A cheap shot. USPS operates under a huge array of constraints and mandates. Here's a recent example from my current CongressCritter, Chris Pappas: Pappas Secures Provisions in Funding Legislation to Permanently Halt Consolidation of USPS Processing and Distribution Centers. His proposed legislation hasn't passed as yet, but it's easy to see that it wouldn't help USPS "get its priorities straight". It would, instead, compel USPS to maintain expensive facilities and services it would prefer to close.

By most accounts, the U.S. Postal Service remains among the most popular of federal agencies. And despite the numerous challenges of operating in the Internet age, universal, timely mail delivery remains high on the public agenda.

In a post I can't find now, Bryan Caplan discussed the difference between "stated preferences" and "revealed preferences". In short, if you're searching for insight, look at what people do instead of what they say.

Yes, people "say" they like the USPS and its various cosmic goals. But what they do is, increasingly, use alternate methods of communication.

In this case: USPS's first class mail volume peaked a quarter-century ago, in 2000. It's down 58% since then.

Mr. Rooks, it ain't gonna come back.

It simply isn’t true that mail service is outmoded; not everything can be accomplished online, and the continuing popularity of everything from birthday cards to mail-in ballots demonstrates that continued deterioration of service is, or at least should be, unacceptable.

There are other ways to get cards and ballots to their recipients than propping up the USPS monopoly. See below.

To the degree that the postal service has a plan for its primary mission, mail delivery, it seems to rely on cutting service standards along with increasing rates, a sure formula for failure. Rather than seeking to build its business through consistent performance, it seems content to manage decline.

There is no magic plan that will prevent "decline", especially for a service that's a legal monopoly. (Just ask landline telephone providers or cable TV services.)

The persistent inability to deliver the mail stems in large part from a 2013 contract that mandated what is in effect a two-tier wage system for letter carriers, who represent the largest number of postal workers.

This is a persistent gripe among unionized letter carriers.

The contract creates “career” and “non-career” tracks, and most of the hiring since then has involved non-career positions. Since new employees are being paid far less for the same work, it has a demoralizing effect on postal unions and has contributed to the epidemic of erratic delivery.

Needless to say, "fixing" the two-tier system along the lines favored by the relevant union negotiators would blow a big hole in the already dire USPS financial picture.

It used to be that a missed day was extremely rare. Now, there just aren’t enough carriers to cover the routes, a problem that peaked during the pandemic but has continued ever since. The bump-up in wage rates for other entry-level jobs has just made the shortage of carriers more acute.

A more nuanced story is provided by the USPS Inspector General: Examining Trends in the Postal Service’s Workforce Composition.

It should be obvious that hiring more employees to handle declining mail volume is not a sustainable strategy.

As one postal worker put it, “There used to be a line out the door to submit applications for vacant positions. Now we can hardly find anyone.”

"Pay us more, and we'll do a better job." I think they got this argument from public school teachers.

On the face of it, there are few reasons for optimism. The departed postmaster general, Louis DeJoy, was a logistics expert in the package business with no credible plan for improving mail delivery. His successor, appointed by President Trump and arriving in July, just in time for the latest five-cent rate increase, is David Steiner, a board member for FedEx.

Note Rooks' snide references to DeJoy's and Steiner's successful private-sector histories. Can't have that!

But a new labor contract is due, and there are some recent examples that could help the postal service remedy its labor discontent, if it’s willing to listen.

We should all be willing to listen, I suppose.

UPS in 2023 provided a negotiated package that substantially improved working conditions, and has led to a hiring boom with increased job satisfaction. Even more pertinent, the United Auto Workers negotiated contracts the same year that will phase out the hated two-tier wage system also installed at the time of the Great Recession.

Yes, we'll see how that works out for them.

Postal unions operating within the confines of a government agency have not always been as successful, but in this case maintaining the package business could suggest changes that might improve how the mail is handled – beginning with, most obviously, coordinated delivery to the same addresses.

I don't know about you, but I'm seeing a lot of handwaving here.

Eventually, the public will have to make its views known more clearly, but the Trump administration is making a serious mistake by cutting many of the agencies voters rate most highly, including the National Weather Service, the National Park Service and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC.)

Irrelevant. Unlike those other agencies, the USPS is legally required to be self-funding. (They do, however, get special tax treatment and other indirect subsidies.)

The postal service, given its quasi-independent status, is a special case, but its neglect is equally unjustifiable, especially given the president’s preoccupation with increasing defense spending and calling it “war,” use of the military for municipal takeovers, and homeland security crackdowns.

We get it, Doug. You're not a Trump fan. Neither am I, but let's stay on topic.

It would be a novelty to organize a campaign around government services that people actually want and trust, but it has to be worth trying.

I was kind of kidding about the pre-shredding above, but there's something else "worth trying", USPS-wise:

• Privatize it!
• Privatize it!
• Privatize it!
• Privatize it!