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>If running a postal service that reaches all of the country is a money losing proposition, that's a terrible reason to privatize it, if you think it's in the n
by criley2 13y ago
>If running a postal service that reaches all of the country is a money losing proposition, that's a terrible reason to privatize it, if you think it's in the national benefit to have a postal service.
Your analysis assumes the public implementation is equivalent with a private one.
The reality is that without the enforced monopoly of the USPS and the Congress to protect it, a private business would be profitable.
They'd also charge more to achieve it.
But that's Capitalism, and by all means mail is most likely artificially priced far below what the market would naturally support.
- bmelton 13y agoBoth true, but I'd be remiss if I didn't point out what (I think) is the bigger point -- UPS and FedEx couldn't deliver a package to every doorstep for flat price of a stamp. This wouldn't necessarily mean that they'd raise prices across the board, but for some residences, it would almost certainly require more than $0.42 (or whatever it is now) to deliver to. My uncle owns over 2,000 mountainy acres in an extremely rural area. Mail to his house takes his postman literally a half an hour out of his way, through treacherous (but paved, sort of) roads, and which is impossible to deliver to in a snow storm. Still, it only takes the cost of a single stamp for me to send him a letter. Him being a nice guy though, has an arrangement with the local post office (or maybe just the postman, I don't know how official or allowed it is) where they suspend junk mail until something legit comes in so that they don't have to make erroneous trips except for when he actually has a package. If he happens to be in town and hasn't received mail, he'll swing by the post office and pick his mail up there.