United States Postal Service Full Service Approved
Highlights
- 1960 rates
- 50-year throwback
- Google is rumored
In an effort to stimulate mail volume, the Postal Service announced today that they will be cutting postage back to its 1960 rate of 4 cents for a first-class letter, a reduction of a whopping 40 cents. According to Postmaster General Jack Potter in the USPS press release, the 50-year throwback pricing is currently an experiment set to end at the beginning of July, but could be implemented permanently if mail volume increases significantly enough.
The new pricing policy is expected to result in an increase in postal revenue of at least 12 percent if volume increases according to initial projections. While this wouldn’t cover the losses of the last couple of years, Potter was quoted as saying it is, “a step in the right direction.”
Postal representatives also hinted that if the price cuts do not work as expected, they could throw in the towel altogether on delivering mail and selling out to the private market, much like the Dutch postal system. Google is rumored to be interested in making a deal, after having run out of online companies to buy.