The white whale of government privatization in Missouri is Springfield’s City Utilities, a municipal utility behemoth that should be broken up and privatized to make a fortune for Springfield taxpayers now and result in better utility services in the long run for residents. But at the national level, the privatization white whale has long been the U.S. Post Office. So, it is exciting to hear President Trump declare that he is open to the privatization of the post office.
There are many arguments for maintaining the current post office monopoly on mail, and economic efficiency isn’t one of them. Arguments include:
- The necessity of subsidizing rural life (especially really, really, rural life)
- General feelings about preserving “public goods,” as if getting a folder of advertisements delivered to your door each day is a “public good.”
And the one argument supporters of the post office usually don’t say out loud:
- Maintaining a small army of allied voters on the public payroll.
There are several ways the nation could go about privatizing the post office. The easiest would be to simply remove its monopoly protections against other companies delivering mail. That wouldn’t be privatization, but it would give people a choice to use other options for routine mail services.
Even with all the advantages the post office has over Fed Ex, UPS, etc., such as not paying taxes, exemption from parking regulations, and so on, it still manages to lose a lot of money each year.
Let’s face it. In the modern world, mail is no longer a necessary public service for the vast majority of people. For the people who still need it, there is no reason they should get subsidized service paid for (even if indirectly) by the rest of us. If you don’t want to adapt to technology or choose to live in outer Alaska, that’s fine, but you should pay more for your mail.
I write this at Christmas time, which is the only time that many people make use of the mail anymore. My family is sending out Christmas cards now, and we will pay the same price whether we mail a card to neighbors across the street or to friends and family in New York. Those price mandates and mail protections are absurd. I’d like us to sell the entire post office to the highest bidder, but short of that opening it up to competition is the next best thing.
