Hold on to your hats, folks, because the Postal Service just raised the price of a stamp from 63 cents to 66 cents! Outrageous, right? But before you start planning your protest march, let me tell you something: we Americans have it pretty good when it comes to snail mail. We pay some of the lowest postal rates in the developed world, so why not cough up a few extra pennies for a stamp?
Let’s get real and compare ourselves to our fellow countries. According to a report by Deutsche Post, most European countries charge way more than us to mail a dang letter. Some places even charge many times more! So next time you’re grumbling about the higher price of a stamp, remember that you could be living across the pond.
Speaking of the price, a stamp now costs 66 cents. That may sound like a lot, but think about it for a minute. For 66 cents, you can have someone come to your house, pick up a letter, and deliver it anywhere in the country within a few days. Amazing, right? We’re talking about various modes of transportation, complex machinery, and the labor of multiple workers here. This is a tribute to human genius, people!
And let’s not forget about the distances that these letters have to travel. The rate is the same no matter where you’re sending it, whether it’s from Florida to Alaska (which is over 4,000 miles as the crow flies) or to Hawaii. So let’s give a pat on the back to our postal workers and the difficult task they have to endure.
As low as our postal rates are, they’ve remained relatively the same for the last fifty years or so. Adjusting for inflation, it’s only a bit below the current stamp price. Plus, the countries that do have lower postage rates are generally smaller and don’t face the same delivery challenges as the US Postal Service. Take Singapore, for example. You can send a letter for 23 cents, but their entire country is smaller than New York City. So, let’s cut our postal workers some slack here.
Something else to keep in mind is that the Postal Service is self-funded. Unlike other federal agencies, it’s required to pay for itself. If it has a shortfall, it borrows money from the Treasury Department to balance its books. Thankfully, a bill was passed last year that improved the post office’s finances by wiping away $57 billion in liabilities and removing a requirement to pre-pay retiree benefits. But to keep them afloat, they need to raise rates.
Despite the higher price, we Americans know the value of the Postal Service. It binds us together as a nation, and when we pay those extra few cents, we’re subsidizing delivery to rural areas that might not be profitable otherwise. Isn’t that worth it? Plus, let’s be real, the Postal Service is one of the most popular agencies in the federal government, and they manage to deliver the mail with remarkable efficiency. So, let’s not complain too much about a few extra cents. We got this, America!
Serious News: washingtonpost
