It's supposed to, but it loses money every year. Billions. And is bailed out by the taxpayer.JimC wrote:Doesn't your postal service operate on a for profit basis? Ours certainly does, and, in a similar way, was having big financial worries with the downturn in both private and business letters, given email and on-line bill paying etc. Their salvation came in the big increase of parcel delivery, including stuff from Amazon.Forty Two wrote:
Does being in favor of free markets mean that we should allow Amazon To receive “... benefits from billions in subsidies from the U.S. Post office while skirting sales taxes....”. Which other retailers have to pay? Unlike others, they pay little or no taxes to state & local governments, use our Postal System as their Delivery Boy (causing tremendous loss to the U.S.), and are putting many thousands of retailers out of business as a result - does being in favor of free markets mean being in favor of that?
So, are you evil socialists over there, or will you let your postal service operate freely in the market? If their business plan lets them charge Amazon a bit more, then so be it...
They aren't operating freely in the market. Congress has barred USPS from setting its parcel prices below its costs, to keep it from unfairly undercutting competitors like FedEx and UPS. But the formula for calculating those costs, set in 2006, hasn’t kept pace as packages have come to make up a higher and higher percentage of USPS volume. The law set the share of infrastructure costs associated with packages at 5.5%, but boxes now make up around 25% of Postal Service revenue. Based on the applicable formula, the cost of Amazon boxes is underpriced by about $1.50 a box. That translates to billions.
Also, Amazon is getting subsidies as described here -- https://newrepublic.com/article/146540/ ... er-dollars
Are you interested in the free market being allowed to function for real? Or, do you just criticize Trump when he says one company is being unfairly benefitted?
