• dhork@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    The USPS financial situation is complicated. It has a legal monopoly on first-class letter delivery, but that is less and less valuable every year as more simple communications move to the Internet. And it is also the only government agency that not only has to fund its own retirement benefits for its employees, but has to plan to put money away now to help cover retirement needs over the next 75 years.

    Take away that retirement funding mandate, which no other agency has, and the USPS is profitable most years.

    Making things worse is that the USPS has its own debt limit, separate from the Federal debt limit, which it is right up against right now.

    So yes, they lose money, but mainly due to constraints set by Congress, that no other agency has.

    Analysis here: https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-us-postal-services-fiscal-crisis/