[T3] Our Postal Service

[Jim Adney]

An open letter to the VW Type 3 community

I just drove another package to our local Post Office; I do this once or twice 
a week. Also, about once a week, our mailman delivers a package to our 
front door. He does this in the course of his ~300 visits a year to our house. 
Most of those packages I get are Type 3 parts, sent here for repairs, or parts 
that I need to make those repairs. A few people send their parts via UPS, but 
the vast majority use the United States Postal Service (USPS.) I believe they 
do so because it's the most convenient way for those of us who don't have a 
business with daily UPS pickup and delivery. It's also usually the cheapest 
way to ship parts.

I understand that many people view the USPS with disdain, blaming them for 
the junk mail we all get, but junk mail isn't the Post Office's fault. Part of the 
beauty of the USPS is that they are required to deliver whatever, within 
limits, they are given. They don't get to pick and choose who they will deliver 
for and who they will refuse. It's a universal service that we too often take for 
granted.

Right now the USPS is in trouble. The reduced business caused by the 
COVID-19 Pandemic has hit the USPS hard, and the federal relief that got 
offered to private businesses, like airlines and cruise lines, was denied to 
the USPS. There are political forces which would prefer that this service be a 
business that could deliver profit into private hands, set their own rates, and 
pick and choose their customers. Laws passed by congress have limited the 
USPS's ability to set their own rates, while also requiring the USPS to 
completely fund all their employee retirement costs 75 years into the future. 
This means that our USPS is now funding retirement costs for employees 
who have not yet been born. No other business anywhere in the world is 
required to do this. It's only purpose is to force the USPS to run at a loss 
every year, because it's much easier to say something is poorly run if it is 
running in the red.

If we do nothing, it appears that the USPS will be shut down sometime this 
fall.

Let's consider what it would mean to not have a Postal Service. We would 
be the only 1st or 2nd world country to not have a national mail system. A 
large number of US citizens would no longer get mail pickup and delivery 
~300 days a year. Some of those people even depend on the USPS for 
delivery of medicine, because they can't get out to pick it up themselves. We 
would all have to pay higher prices for whatever private service replaced the 
USPS. (Those profits have to come from somewhere.) Did you know that 
UPS has always charged $1 extra for residential delivery? Rural customers 
would likely be required to pay much higher prices, or be required to drive 
into town for their "mail." Amazon Prime customers (I'm not one) even get 
Sunday delivery, which UPS would probably gladly do, but for a price.

I realize that this message is likely to be viewed by some as "off topic," but 
it's not as "off topic" as you might think. I still have a few more years in me, 
fixing Type 3 parts that no one else cares to do, but if the USPS is killed, 
that will affect my ability to serve this niche. It will make my job harder, and 
at my age, 74, harder is a problem.

I have written my Congressman and my Senators.  For those of you in the 
US, I encourage you to do the same. Fixing this problem should not be a 
partisan issue, but I realize that it now is. If you're on the con side of this 
issue, I encourage you to put on your thinking cap and try to think about how 
to run this like a business while someone else sets your rates and requires 
you to fully fund your retirement costs 75 years into the future.  

For a good review of this problem, I recommend this video from John Oliver. 
He claims the USPS retirement costs are only 50 years into the future, but 
everything else I've heard says 75. Either way, it's absurd.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoL8g0W9gAQ&t=2s  

If you're overly bothered by the F-word or John's excellent sense of humor, 
feel free to skip this.  ;-)

And if you have more questions, ask your mailman.

And, thanks for reading this far.  

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Jim Adney, jadney at vwtype3.org
Madison, Wisconsin, USA
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