Yes, 44 cents is cheap. Of course, that’s not the real cost, as the post office is heavily subsidized and has been losing money for years. In FY 2010, they posted an $8.5 billion dollar loss. It would be interesting to understand what the true cost of that 44 cent letter, if this debt were paid by the user as opposed to from federal revenues.As for delivery to your home, versus pickup, I would point out that the idean of postal stations for delivery predates the delivery to one’s home (all the way back to ca.500BC, in Persia). Additionally, private services will most certainly deliver to one’s home.As to the motto quoted in the comic, it’s interesting to note that it also harkens back to ancient Persia, and Herodotus described the system in this way: “It is said that as many days as there are in the whole journey, so many are the men and horses that stand along the road, each horse and man at the interval of a day’s journey; and these are stayed neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed.”
Yes, 44 cents is cheap. Of course, that’s not the real cost, as the post office is heavily subsidized and has been losing money for years. In FY 2010, they posted an $8.5 billion dollar loss. It would be interesting to understand what the true cost of that 44 cent letter, if this debt were paid by the user as opposed to from federal revenues.As for delivery to your home, versus pickup, I would point out that the idean of postal stations for delivery predates the delivery to one’s home (all the way back to ca.500BC, in Persia). Additionally, private services will most certainly deliver to one’s home.As to the motto quoted in the comic, it’s interesting to note that it also harkens back to ancient Persia, and Herodotus described the system in this way: “It is said that as many days as there are in the whole journey, so many are the men and horses that stand along the road, each horse and man at the interval of a day’s journey; and these are stayed neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed.”