[Buythatcard]

Originally Posted by Yastrzemski Sports

You can do a google search for total revenue for usps to find the numbers. They did a total $70 billion in revenue last year. Each year they average between $65 - $74 billion. So, what happens with a government agency or any large corporation is when revenue goes up they find a way to spend it and they budget a little more for next year. So when revenue goes from $74b to $65b - and they budgeted $76b - they fall short. I’m sure we all wish we had those problems. But the postal service does have a lot of payroll, a lot of pensions and a lot of fuel to pay every day. The average postmaster salary is $74k and almost every town in the US has one.
That being said, when I started mailing cards on eBay in 1998-99 it would cost 49 cents to mail a card in a bubble mailer. Now it’s close to $3. About 4 years ago I could ship a framed photo from NY to CA for under $15. Today it’s $70. So the package cost has risen at an insane rate and their revenue has stayed mainly even so they must be losing a lot on stamped mail.
As it stands, they are still the best deal out there. For small packages under a pound no one else can compete. And unless you are a big seller and negotiate a better price on volume with ups or fedex they are still the best on packages over a pound also.
Buyers have to understand that it costs money to ship things and those costs are going up and they are going to have to pay a little more. And it sucks for all of us as both buyers and sellers.

Well said!