4 ms·

That's an interesting thought and would certainly explain why I haven't been able to relate to the issues people say they have the USPS.

by ziml77 6y ago

Spooky23 6y ago
There’s always been local politics and issues around mail delivery. The GOP crusade against the post office is sort of like a weaponization of certain types of resentment in the south that worked it’s way into conservative media over the years at a national scale. It’s an organization that has adapted over the centuries to new technology and needs. USPS fundamentally transformed most recently when rail-based mail sorting changed 50 years ago. The difference now is that some people feel that government should not work.
- prepend 6y ago
  I hear this a lot, but the problems I’ve had seem to be during dem and republican administrations and in dem and republication controlled states and counties. So the problems that I’ve witnessed seem unrelated to budget pressure issues. So I suppose it’s curious how some places are awesome despite the “crusade” while other places suck. Of course I’ve only had my own experiences as I can’t find any real performance data. Seems actually odd how USPS doesn’t track these metrics much less publish them. For example, what percent letters delivered within 2-3 days. Why isn’t this tracked to the sorting level? Seems like it would actually be pretty easy to add a code to the postmark when received and track it in the sorting machines, etc etc. But this isn’t done. Anyway, this may be the fault. But perhaps it’s a result of the crappiness and lack of efficiency, etc. It’s hard to tell, but hard for me to do anything with as it seems to me like performance depends so much on local post offices and performance was either good or bad consistently, over time. If there was a crusade against the post office that affected performance, I would expect degradation over time, over all locations.
  - epakai 6y ago
    USPS post quarterly delivery statistics. Look under Mailing Services Measurement Results: https://about.usps.com/what/performance/service-performance/ https://about.usps.com/what/performance/service-performance/ Each table for a service type has ~10 years worth of nationwide annual percent on-time delivery. It's harder to compare individual geographic areas (you can change the URL to go back a year or two, not sure where older reports are).
  - Spooky23 6y ago
    A big entity like USPS will have its share of effective and shitty branches. And no political party has a monopoly on incompetence. It’s very evident that the GOP has taken many actions to weaken the finances of the Postal Service and systematically politicize and dismantle parts of it.

That's an interesting thought and would certainly explain why I haven't been able to relate to the issues people say they have the USPS.

by ziml77 6y ago

That's an interesting thought and would certainly explain why I haven't been able to relate to the issues people say they have the USPS.

Spooky23 6y ago

There’s always been local politics and issues around mail delivery. The GOP crusade against the post office is sort of like a weaponization of certain types of resentment in the south that worked it’s way into conservative media over the years at a national scale. It’s an organization that has adapted over the centuries to new technology and needs. USPS fundamentally transformed most recently when rail-based mail sorting changed 50 years ago. The difference now is that some people feel that government should not work.

prepend 6y ago
I hear this a lot, but the problems I’ve had seem to be during dem and republican administrations and in dem and republication controlled states and counties. So the problems that I’ve witnessed seem unrelated to budget pressure issues. So I suppose it’s curious how some places are awesome despite the “crusade” while other places suck. Of course I’ve only had my own experiences as I can’t find any real performance data. Seems actually odd how USPS doesn’t track these metrics much less publish them. For example, what percent letters delivered within 2-3 days. Why isn’t this tracked to the sorting level? Seems like it would actually be pretty easy to add a code to the postmark when received and track it in the sorting machines, etc etc. But this isn’t done. Anyway, this may be the fault. But perhaps it’s a result of the crappiness and lack of efficiency, etc. It’s hard to tell, but hard for me to do anything with as it seems to me like performance depends so much on local post offices and performance was either good or bad consistently, over time. If there was a crusade against the post office that affected performance, I would expect degradation over time, over all locations.
- epakai 6y ago
  USPS post quarterly delivery statistics. Look under Mailing Services Measurement Results: https://about.usps.com/what/performance/service-performance/ https://about.usps.com/what/performance/service-performance/ Each table for a service type has ~10 years worth of nationwide annual percent on-time delivery. It's harder to compare individual geographic areas (you can change the URL to go back a year or two, not sure where older reports are).
- Spooky23 6y ago
  A big entity like USPS will have its share of effective and shitty branches. And no political party has a monopoly on incompetence. It’s very evident that the GOP has taken many actions to weaken the finances of the Postal Service and systematically politicize and dismantle parts of it.