From the NYT, a story about how the post office plans to adjust the realities of the digital age.
The financially beleaguered Postal Service announced Tuesday that it would consider closing more than 3,600 of its 32,000 post offices.
Continuing efforts to reduce costs by shrinking the organization’s retail network and work force, Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe released a list of the targeted offices, which are primarily in rural locations and produce little revenue. There will be a 60-day comment period before the Postal Service makes a final decision, which can be appealed to the Postal Regulatory Commission.
In communities that lose post offices, the Postal Service may outsource basic services, like selling stamps and shipping flat-rate packages, to local businesses like pharmacies and groceries, Mr. Donahoe said.
“The Postal Service of the future will be smaller, leaner and more competitive,” he said in a statement.
The post office is one of the few agencies that can trace itself to a delegated constitutional power. As we argue in both 2301 and 2302, the post office has served a commercial function since its early days by providing cheap means of sending items from any address in the nation to any other. A perennial question is whether this service is too cheap.
- 21st Century Coalition: Focusing the Impact of the Mailing Industry In a Time of Crisis
