Saving The Post Office: The Models Of Kiwibank And Japan Post

Neither rain nor sleet nor snow may have stopped the Pony Express, but the nation's oldest and second-largest employer is now under attack. Claiming the United States Postal Service (USPS) is bankrupt, critics are pushing legislation that would defuse the postal crisis by breaking the backs of the postal workers' unions and mandating widespread layoffs. But the "crisis" is an artificial one, created by Congress itself.

In 2006, Congress passed the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act (PAEA), which forced the USPS to put aside billions of dollars to pay for the health benefits of employees, many of whom hadn't even been hired yet. Over a mere ten-year period, the USPS was required to pre-fund its future health care benefit payments to retirees for the next 75 years, something no other government or private corporation is required to do. As consumer advocate Ralph Nader observed, if PAEA had never been enacted, USPS would now be facing a $1.5 billion surplus.

The USPS is a profitable, self-funded venture that is not supported by the taxpayers. It is funded with postage stamps - one of the last vestiges of government-issued money. Stamps are fungible and can be traded at par, and they are backed, not by mere government "fiat," but by labor. One stamp will buy the labor to transport your letter 3,000 miles.

The USPS is one of the few businesses the government is allowed to operate in competition with private companies; it is the only US agency that services all its citizens six days per week; and it is perhaps the last form of communication that protects privacy, since tampering with it is against federal law. In 1999, the US employed nearly a million people, and today, it employs around 600,000. Where are those workers to go when the post office is no more?

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