Michael writes:

> I don't much care which particular branch of government is taking my money,
>  or what excuse they give for taking it, or what they call the particular
>  method they use to do the taking.

The one thing that seems to be forgotten in all of this is that the USPS is
providing a *service*. It's NOT collecting a tax, as has been suggested.
While the Post Office is government-owned corporation, and not a government
agency per se, the more important attribute of the USPS is that it is
physically picking up letters and packages and transporting them across the
country at what I consider to be genuinely reasonable prices, at
reliabilities and service levels that truly approach FedEx or UPS.

While the postal services of some very small countries do use their postal
services as revenue generators (primarily by issuing commerative stamps, not
by taxing their own citizens), the vast majority of postal services around
the world have to be *subsidized* by additional tax revenues gathered from
other sources. The USPS for a number of years now has actually turned a
profit. Moreover, that profit does not go back into the general revenue fund
of the US government but rather is re-invested within the USPS itself.

As a corporation, we use FedEx as our primary mode of shipment not to insure
delivery, but primarily for prestige. That's a perfectly legitimate reason to
spend five times as much on a package, but if it weren't for that reason
alone, we would use the Post Office more than we do.

Wirt Atmar