This post is prompted by the hysteria being ginned up by politicians over the United States Postal Service (hereafter to be referred to as the USPS).
First some facts and history about the USPS. The USPS (it's predecessor actually, but for all intents and purposes - the same organization) was an original part of the US Government and even before that Benjamin Franklin was appointed the first Postmaster General by the Continental Congress in 1775 to oversee the newly formed Post Office Department (he had been Postmaster General of the Colonies). It was recognized that the efficient and timely movement of the mail was critical to communication in a large and widespread land. The Post Office Department was made a Cabinet level department by President Washington in 1792 after the Postal Service Act of 1791. The Post Office remained a Cabinet level department until 1971 when the USPS was formed. It is now a semi-autonomous organization that has its own budgeting and is administered by a Board of Governors similarly to the Federal Reserve. The Governors are appointed by the President and are affirmed by the Senate. They then select the Postmaster General in consultation with the President and with consent of the Senate.
The USPS has never done well at making money or even breaking even. From after WWII (1946) until last year it made money only 17 of the 63 years. Even though it is not on the US budget directly it does receive support and subsidies from the US Government. So the USPS has cost taxpayers hundreds of billions over the last 63 years. For this reason there have been many "restructurings" and "realignments" proposed, attempted, and sometimes carried out. The issue is, the USPS is a political football. Any mention of doing what needed/needs to be done to stop the bleeding is fought strongly. However the number of Post Offices peaked in the late 1800s (yes 1800s) at over 70,000. In 2019 there were 25,362. A huge number were closed as roads and railways were built and made moving mail longer distances possible. There have been few closures since 2000. As for pieces of mail, that number peaked in 2000 at 208 billion pieces (yes Billion) and has dropped each year. In 2019 the number was 142.5 billion. The number of postal collection boxes also peaked in 2000 at 365,000. The number has dropped to about 153,000 last year. (I know Trump has been blasted for removing boxes, but the Obama administration removed @16,000 over a six year period)
Bottom line:
1) the USPS has been losing money for decades with some limited exceptions.
2) the number of actual post offices has been going down since 1895 with a huge number since WWII.
3) the number of postal drop boxes has been going down since 2000 with a large number removed in the six years from 2010 - 2016.
4) all of this is due to the tremendous drop in pieces of mail also since 2000.
5) the USPS has been a societal "meme" (before memes existed) for many decades as an example of inefficiency. "The check is in the mail" is a standing joke that works as people know that the mail is unreliable as to a definite delivery date. The whole success of FedEx was based on the fact that the USPS could not guarantee delivery of a package within any reasonable window.
Now, this USPS hysteria is totally political. If you look at the numbers above you will see the changes have been going on since the late 1800s and in modern times, precipitously since 2000. President Trump made a remark about cutting funds or not approving funds for the USPS. Fact - the budget for this year has been set. Neither the President nor Congress can cut it. What Trump was referring to was the Covid relief bill (that the Democrats are holding up because they want 2 TRILLION extra dollars included over what the Republican majority Senate has already approved - another topic for another post perhaps) BUT, he has not stopped any funds as the Covid bill has not been presented to him to sign or veto. FYI, that is all the President can do - sign into law or veto a bill. The President does not approve or spend money or the budget. That power is vested in the Congress and more in the House than the Senate. (If you are interested in learning how government works - a couple of posts back I have some "lessons" on civics that goes into that - feel free to read it) Even if the President does veto a bill, the Congress can still override it with enough support and the bill is approved.
One last comment - mail-in voting is NOT absentee voting. The absentee process has been used for decades and has precedent and law behind it. There are checks and balances that help prevent fraud. Mail-in voting is a totally different thing. The checks and balances are not there as there has been no formal vetting or approval of the process. I personally think if at all possible people should be required to go to the polls at the designated time on the designated dates to vote. However, I recognize that there are reasons for absentee voting and have no real issue with it. Mail-in voting - no. The idiotic quote of some infinitesimally small percentage of fraud in mail-in voting is using the numbers from absentee voting. The little bit of mail-in voting that was done in the primaries was much more problematic than that. There were elections that took weeks to decide due to too many ballots showing up or the mail was held up to the point that the election officials were hesitant to certify the results. Even the postal service says the influx of millions of extra pieces of time sensitive mail in a short period of time would overwhelm the system.
Getting great participation in voting and counting each vote is very important. However, the disenfranchisement of a voter can come from either inability to get your vote in and counted, or by an improper or illegal vote getting counted.
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