USPS shipping prices ?

Entrope - I have zero experience shipping equipment but lots of experience shipping documents. UPS 2nd or 3rd day service to a large or medium size city will very often arrive a day earlier than the service requested, sort of a "hidden" discount. Tracking is included in the price (I'm not sure about Priority Mail). It's a good choice for payment, if time is a concern, and may be cost effctive for large dollar transactions. I've had the same experience you did with the timeliness (or lack thereof) of Priority Mail. Express Mail is much better and it is delivered on Saturday for no extra charge, but the rates are not much less than USP or FedEX.

Lugnut - A couple of years ago I read that junk mail is a significant source of revenue for the USPS, supporting the subsidies you refer to. Makes you wonder what would happen to postal rates if junk mail were subjected to a law similar to the "Do not call" law for telemarketers, which I am sure some people with cluttered mailboxes would support. Oh, I agree that Media Mail is a great deal.

Dougmc,

While junk mail is a significant revenue source it is not a source of profit. The history of the Postal Service is an incredible story. Some of the most interesting aspects occured in the late 60's and early 70's when Congress (proving that they are and can be bought) peeled off the most profitable services and handed them over to private enterprise. That's the only reason UPS and Fedex, etc. exist today. The Postal Service is today a quasi-private mix of government/private enterprise. What they provide to society is much more important than most citizens realize. Important enough that the founding fathers ensured it be created as we knew it before the 60's. IMO, the Postal Service is government at its finest. I choose to use it as much as possible because of its reliability and also to add to its profitability so that GWB and the 535 boneheads that control this country don't also wish to turn it over to private enterprise. Would anybody be foolish enough to believe UPS or Fedex would do it as well? Proper functioning of society demands reliable delivery of important documents and most people take for granted what is dropped into their mailbox every day. Sorry for the rant but I feel strongly about this issue along with a number of other issues that can have negative consequences for all of us. Don't get me started on schools. I'd melt down. LOL

Lugnut, I don't dispute your view that the postal service in the US is valuable, but your history is a bit in error. The US post office did not really get into action until the early 1800s and then was basically private enterprise with payment from the government. I discovered all of this when I was researching how much postage was in the past.