The Plight Of The U.S. Postal Service

1A

NPR

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4.3 • 4.5K Ratings

🗓️ 25 March 2026

⏱️ 44 minutes

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Summary

The United States Postal Service has delivered mail for 250 years, from the busiest cities to the most remote parts of the country. But decades of money troubles have left the USPS billions of dollars in debt.

Now, the postmaster general warns that the agency could run out of money by October – and is urging Congress to save it.

We explore the uncertain future of USPS with a panel of experts.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You know to most people, the vast job of handling the mails is a mystery.
0:23.0	Folks simply drop their mail in the neighborhood box, then don't give it another thought.
0:27.3	They just have faith that it will be delivered to the addressee within a day or so anywhere in the United States, or the whole world, for that matter.
0:35.1	Your post office has given such dependable service for so long that speed and accuracy are taken for granted. We're glad for this confidence. Our USA occupies only one-fiftieth of the globe, but we handle nearly two-thirds of all the mail in the world. These are happy facts for our people, but they create real problems for
0:56.3	your postal service. Passports, prescriptions, mail-in ballots, magazines. The United States Postal Service
1:03.0	has been a key piece of infrastructure since it was established in 1775. We rely on the agency to
1:09.1	deliver, rain, or shine. But for nearly every year since 2007,
1:14.6	the agency has been plagued with money troubles to the tune of billions of dollars in losses
1:19.2	each year. And now the situation is even more dire. Here's what Postmaster General David
1:24.0	Steiner told members of the House during a hearing last week. At our current rate, we'll be out of cash in less than 12 months.
1:31.4	So in about a year from now, the Postal Service would be unable to deliver the mail if we continue the status quo.
1:38.1	We asked you what you think about USPS. Here's what Stu and Richmond told us.
1:42.6	The United States Postal Service is in a state of absolute dysfunction where I cannot rely on it to send a letter three miles down the road within four weeks time.
1:56.3	How can we fix this?
1:59.2	How can we fix this? And what, if anything, can or should Congress do to save USPS? I'm Jen White.
2:06.4	You're listening to the 1A podcast. We turn to our guests with those questions and more after this short break.
2:16.5	Let's get right into the conversation with their Postal Service experts.
2:20.2	Joining us in studio is Kevin Kossar.
2:22.5	He's a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
2:25.3	That's a public policy think tank in Washington, D.C.
2:28.0	Kevin, welcome to the program.
2:29.6	Thanks for having me.
	...

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