Friday, June 12, 2009

But, seriously, folks...

Here's the very first change I'd make to the government: repeal the law that makes it illegal for anyone but the USPS to deliver First Class Mail. It might kill the Post Office, but who cares? As long as letters get where we want them to go.

10 comments:

Starsplash said...

I oppose that.

Al said...

Can't allow competition.

The probligo said...

Ho-hum, been there done that.

NZ "sold off" ie made a state-owned corporation out of its postal service.

There were one or two competitors in the initial years; all but one has died out. The survivor is known as "DX" and was started by solicitors, accountants and the like wanting a prompt and assured service between offices.

The NZPost now competes on the open market with couriers and the like. It is surviving, just. Post charges increased by about 30% late last year the first change since privatisation.

The reason for the increase? Competition from email has reduced volumes considerably. The biggest decrease has come in the business market as firms change from posted paper to emailed pdfs for things like invoices and statements, and payments are made by bank transfer instead of cheques.

Al said...

Cool! Sounds like the fascists are getting what they deserve.

Ole Blue The Heretic said...

I like to use FedEX for just about anything.

Big brown and that post office clown thing to lose things.

Starsplash said...

Nope gotta have the detection services under the Gov. thumb.
The USPS is already a quasi-Gov service.

Al said...

You certainly were spanked a lot more than I was.

LibertyBob said...

One thing I like about the USPS is that there are serious laws protecting the items sent through its services. The laws don't actually do any "protecting" but they make it easier to prosecute the hell out of people who mess with it.

Oh well, the USPS will probably be out of business soon enough. Once it is dead it will be tough to start an new government owned service of the type.

The probligo said...

Atcherly, Al, you might have a bit of a problem there. I was reading elsewhere last night (Holmes dissenting views to Lochner in fact) and the subject of the USPS came up.

Read Section 8 of Article One ( Here ) and it is a specific power granted to Congress.

Given the God-given stature of the Constitution, I am surprised that TF hasn't been biting your tail long before now for even suggesting that the USPS should be done away with. It is a God-given service!! You CAN'T stop it!!!

;)

Al said...

It does say that in the Constitution (that's a fun word to type, if nothing else), but there's no requirement for it to be a monopoly. There's also no requirement that it be self-supporting.