The Role of USPS in America: Beyond Just Delivering Mail

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An Atlantic report followed contract carrier Nate Chamberlain as he left the Supai, Arizona, post office with the morning mail. The report described Supai as accessible only on foot or by helicopter when weather allows.

Its mule train makes a 16-mile, six-hour loop five days a week. That route is not a historical display; it is how a remote community stays connected. The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) still matters because federal law requires it to provide prompt, reliable and efficient service in all areas and all communities.

The network people still use

First-Class Mail volume fell by 2.2 billion pieces, or 5 percent, in fiscal 2025 compared with the prior year. The shrinking letter business does not erase the network; it changes what must pay for it.

The Government Accountability Office said that rural areas may have few alternatives to USPS for mail and packages. That dependence explains why postal performance is a public-policy question, not just a choice between delivery brands. USPS describes its mission as binding the nation together through universal service. Email can replace a message, but it cannot deliver a ballot, a passport application or a prescription.

A public service with business rules

Title 39 of the U.S. Code establishes USPS as an independent establishment of the executive branch. It is therefore a government institution with unusual operating independence, not a cabinet department and not a private corporation. The same law requires prompt, reliable and efficient service in all areas and all communities. Profitability cannot by itself decide where service exists.

The Board of Governors appoints and may remove the Postmaster General. The board’s appointee began serving on July 15, 2025. That structure puts day-to-day leadership at arm’s length from the president, while Congress still writes the governing duties. Congress designed USPS to cover its costs primarily through selling products and delivering mail and packages. The difficult part is making that business model serve a legal promise that includes unprofitable places.

What the post office counter provides

Postal revenue includes Certified Mail, Post Office (PO) boxes, return receipts, money orders and passport services. Those services turn a local post office into a government counter as well as a mailing point. Thousands of post offices accept first-time passport applications for the U.S. Department of State.

A first-time applicant completes Form DS-11 but does not sign it until a postal employee can witness the signature. A domestic postal money order can be worth up to $1,000 and can be purchased with cash or a debit card, but not a credit card. General Delivery is a temporary mail option for transient customers, people without a permanent location and customers waiting for a PO box. These options matter most when a household lacks another nearby office, bank or stable delivery address.

Universal service follows the map

Supai’s mail route is an extreme example of what universal service requires. Reaching that address does not resemble ordinary suburban delivery. The USPS Office of Inspector General has noted that rural delivery points may be far apart and mailboxes may sit far from homes.

Federal law requires the maximum degree of effective and regular service to rural areas and small towns, and it bars closing a small post office solely because it runs a deficit. After Glacier, Washington, residents warned in 2025 that losing their post office would disrupt service, Rep. Rick Larsen said USPS committed to keep it open while pursuing a new contract.

USPS responded to Larsen on December 5, 2025. A promise to remain open and a closure decision are different stages. After a closure or consolidation determination, a person served by that office has 30 days to appeal to the Postal Regulatory Commission.

Postage pays most of the bill

The Postal Regulatory Commission says customers generally fund USPS, although Congress authorized taxpayer support through the Postal Service Reform Act of 2022. For fiscal 2025, USPS reported $80.5 billion in operating revenue and a $9.0 billion net loss. The financial gap is real, but the policy choice is not simply whether to eliminate every route that loses money. Congress must decide how much universal service to require and how much of its cost should fall on postal customers.

At a March 17, 2026 House hearing, Postmaster General David Steiner argued that a 90- to 95-cent First-Class stamp would largely solve the Postal Service’s controllable loss. In the Postal Service’s accounts, controllable loss excludes expenses that management does not control. First-Class and Marketing Mail are called market-dominant products because USPS is considered to hold a monopoly in those services.

The commission reviews market-dominant rate filings using inflation, changes in the number of delivery points per piece of mail, and retirement-related pricing authority. That review limits management’s freedom to close the gap through prices alone. Keep US Posted, a group representing consumers, nonprofits and newspapers, asked for a rate freeze on July 3, 2025. Its strongest objection is that repeated increases can drive away the mail volume on which the self-funding model depends.

Competitors also use the network

Congressional Research Service classifies First-Class and Marketing Mail as market-dominant products, while package services compete with companies such as FedEx and UPS. The postal monopoly is therefore narrower than the whole delivery business. Federal law bars market-dominant products from subsidizing competitive products. The commission’s incremental-cost test compares collective costs for competitive products with their collective revenue. For fiscal 2025, the commission found competitive products satisfied the cross-subsidy rule.

Parcel Select requires large shippers to aggregate packages and drop them close to the delivery point. USPS then supplies the last trip on a route it already serves. That arrangement makes a private carrier or large merchant both a competitor and a customer of the public network. The accounting rule matters because the same institution holds a protected letter business and sells package delivery in a competitive market.

The network carries public business

USPS says mail plays an important role in elections. The 2026 guide told election officials to send military and overseas ballots at least 45 days before that year’s general election. For a mailed ballot, follow the election office’s instructions and mail early enough for the applicable state deadline.

The Department of Veterans Affairs says more than 330,000 veterans receive a prescription by mail each workday. A delay can therefore affect medicine as well as correspondence. Passport acceptance, election mail and medicine delivery use the same retail and transportation system that moves ordinary mail.

Mail has its own police and privacy rules

Postal inspectors are federal law-enforcement officers who carry firearms, make arrests, execute federal search warrants and serve subpoenas. Opening U.S. Mail during an investigation requires a federal Rule 41 search warrant issued by a federal court and executed by a postal inspector. The government can investigate crimes involving the mail, but sealed contents do not become open to inspection merely because they entered the postal system.

A mail cover records information on the outside of sealed or unsealed mail, or lawful information inside unsealed mail. It tracks addressing and routing information without authorizing an officer to open sealed contents. The Inspection Service tells victims to report suspected mail theft online or at 1-877-876-2455 and to call 911 for a crime in progress.

In a Los Angeles investigation covering October 2020 through August 2023, nine federal search warrants resulted in the seizure of stolen checks, other evidence and about $1 million in cash. At the time of the report’s publication, inspectors had arrested nine charged conspirators. That case shows why postal enforcement covers both stolen mail and the fraud built from it.

Service changes have referees

Service performance is the speed and reliability with which postal service meets established delivery standards. In fiscal 2025, only 7 of 27 market-dominant product categories met their performance targets. A slower standard and weak performance are separate problems: one changes the promise, and the other misses it. On January 6, 2026, the American Postal Workers Union said two extensions of service standards since 2021 had significantly slowed First-Class Mail.

For a nationwide or substantially nationwide service change, Title 39 requires USPS to request a Postal Regulatory Commission advisory opinion before the change takes effect. The opinion does not let the commission run the network, but it creates a public record before a national change. Performance data then show whether the new promise and the actual result match.

The next network is still being decided

Delivering for America is the Postal Service’s 10-year transformation plan for network modernization, financial sustainability and service improvement. The Postal Service implemented its latest nationwide service-standard changes in two phases on April 1 and July 1, 2025. Those standards are in effect, so the live dispute concerns their results and whether Congress or the Postal Service should change course.

Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto and Marsha Blackburn introduced legislation on January 15, 2026, that was referred to the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. GovInfo listed that referral as the bill’s last action.

For an unresolved service problem, file a rate or service inquiry with the Postal Regulatory Commission; the Postal Service has 45 days to respond. For a policy proceeding, submit a comment in the relevant commission docket and identify the service, location and evidence at issue. The enduring question is how to finance a network that must reach everyone while measuring honestly whether it delivers the service it promises.