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WSJ Op-Ed: The Post Office Is Delivering Amazon's Packages Below Cost (zerohedge.com)
schwit1 shares a pay-walled op-ed from the Wall Street Journal (also excerpted at the URL below):
The U.S. Postal Service delivers the company's boxes well below its own costs. Like an accelerant added to a fire, this subsidy is speeding up the collapse of traditional retailers in the U.S. and providing an unfair advantage for Amazon... First-class mail effectively subsidizes the national network, and the packages get a free ride. An April analysis from Citigroup estimates that if costs were fairly allocated, on average parcels would cost $1.46 more to deliver...
My analysis of available data suggests that around two-thirds of Amazon's domestic deliveries are made by the Postal Service. It's as if Amazon gets a subsidized space on every mail truck... Congress should demand the enforcement of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act, and the Postal Service needs to stop picking winners and losers in the retail world. The federal government has had its thumb on the competitive scale for far too long.
My analysis of available data suggests that around two-thirds of Amazon's domestic deliveries are made by the Postal Service. It's as if Amazon gets a subsidized space on every mail truck... Congress should demand the enforcement of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act, and the Postal Service needs to stop picking winners and losers in the retail world. The federal government has had its thumb on the competitive scale for far too long.
No USPS, no deliveries to those locations.
Capitalism doesn't work that way. For remote locations there is no incentive for UPS/FedEx to provide duplicate delivery against a competitor delivering below cost (urban and suburban postal customers subsidize rural customers). But once the USPS was gone, they would offer services. These would, of course, be more expensive than USPS, because the cross subsidies would be gone. But that is a good thing. There is no rational reason that one group of citizens should subsidize the lifestyle choice of another group.