Re:We mailed one hundred letters to test the postal service
by callmeal on Monday May 03, 2021 @10:15AM
(#27025351)
>Is there any real competition to USPS?
I don't understand. USPS is not a business. It's civic infrastructure. There is no way any competitor will agree to delivering a letter from one end of the country to another for $0.55.
Re:We mailed one hundred letters to test the postal service
by brap on Monday May 03, 2021 @01:33PM
(#27028068)
So if I understand correctly, through government subsidization and regulation it is virtually impossible to compete with USPS. What are their incentives to improve their service and reduce their costs (including taxpayer costs)?
Re:We mailed one hundred letters to test the postal service
by JoeAltmaier on Monday May 03, 2021 @10:17AM
(#27025364)
Letters are a tiny insignificant fraction of the USPS traffic. Is it still important? Are there alternatives? That's very arguable (direct deposit; digital signature etc).
Re:We mailed one hundred letters to test the postal service
by dqx on Monday May 03, 2021 @11:10AM
(#27026076)
No, the USPS has the Congressional monopoly on the delivery of non-urgent letters and delivery direct to mailboxes at residential and commercial locations. They specifically do not have any competition in those cases.
In my own country, the government owned postal service is complete trash. Yeah, it’s almost “free”, but we’re paying for it in taxes, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it actually costs way more than private carriers. Not to mention that the workers are incredibly lazy and rude, and opening hours are ridiculous. I’ve ordered a package which took 5 days to get here from the other side of the planet, by private carriers, and then it got stuck in the national mail service for 3 months. The seller was kind enough to resend the package, but I’m not sure if it’ll ever make it either.
What are you gonna do, choose the competitors? They still get their check.