The U.S. Postal Service Was in Bad Shape. Then the Virus Came

The U.S. Postal Service handles almost half of the world’s mail volume -- 142.6 billion pieces in fiscal 2019 alone. It’s one of the largest employers in the U.S., with more than 630,000 career and contract workers. And it could run out of cash by Sept. 30 without a taxpayer bailout. One of America’s oldest institutions, the Postal Service had suffered years of financial decline even before mail volume collapsed due to the coronavirus pandemic. Complicating matters is President Donald Trump’s longstanding contention that Amazon.com Inc. drains the postal service of money it can’t afford to lose.

It’s supposed to fund itself. Though its roots go back to 1775, when Benjamin Franklin was appointed the first postmaster general, the modern Postal Service was established in 1971 as an independent agency, with a mandate to provide universal mail delivery services at a fair price. The Postal Service boasts that it would rank 44th in the Fortune 500 if it were a private company, with revenue of more than $71 billion in fiscal 2019. Most of that revenue comes from “market-dominant” products, including first-class mail and periodicals. A smaller but growing share comes from competitive products, such as priority mail and packages, pitting the Postal Service against FedEx Corp. and United Parcel Service Inc. The Postal Service has limited authority to boost its revenue by introducing new products or increasing postal rates, which must be approved by the Postal Regulatory Commission.