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Speaker 1: Hey, friends and family, it's me Josh, your pal, your buddy,

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Speaker 1: avenging angel, all that jazz. For this week's s Y

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Speaker 1: s K Selects. I've chosen How the US Postal Service

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Speaker 1: Works because, as you may know, the postal services under

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Speaker 1: threat of being closed and going under yet again, and

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Speaker 1: we don't want that. For some reason, we can't quite

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Speaker 1: put our finger on. So I hope you'll enjoy this

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Speaker 1: episode and it rouses you to do something like save

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Speaker 1: the post Office. Welcome to Stuff. You should know, a

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Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, and

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Speaker 1: welcome to the podcast. Uh, there's Charles w Chuck Bryant.

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Speaker 1: I'm Amy Goodman. This is Democracy Now, the Warrant Peace Report,

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Speaker 1: warr in peace dot Org, etcetera. I'm Stevenski. How you

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Speaker 1: doing good. Jerry just said let's do this old school

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Speaker 1: right before she recorded, and I have no idea what

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Speaker 1: she meant. Speck in like, yeah, you know she's back.

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Speaker 1: I thought she meant, let's make it crappy in five

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Speaker 1: minutes long, and we need like little empty tin cans

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Speaker 1: to speak and dude, make it sound right. How you doing, Jerry?

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Speaker 1: That's great. Jerry gave us the thumbs up, I know

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Speaker 1: in our new murder room. Um, Jerry is within our

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Speaker 1: eyesight again after a long layoff where she was not

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Speaker 1: within our range of viewing. It's kind of weird because

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Speaker 1: now I'm looking at you, but I can clearly see

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Speaker 1: my peripheral vision that she says on Facebook. She's waving,

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Speaker 1: she's brusting her teeth, she's reranging the severed human heads

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Speaker 1: that are in jars all around the place. That's creepy. Um.

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Speaker 1: You want to talk post office man, you want to

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Speaker 1: give the disclaimer that we're only talking about the post

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Speaker 1: office in the US of A. Think he just did. Okay, Um,

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Speaker 1: we don't know how it works in your country. No,

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Speaker 1: And actually it's probably not nearly as interesting as what's

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Speaker 1: going on with the US Postal Service, the USPS. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: because I don't know if you know this or not chucked,

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Speaker 1: but the U s PS is in a lot of

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Speaker 1: trouble there. Yeah, there's solvency that the amount of money

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Speaker 1: that they have to keep the lights on and keep

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Speaker 1: everything going is expected to run out in October of

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Speaker 1: two thousand thirteen if they don't do something. Yeah, that's

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Speaker 1: this year. Yeah, I think they lost sixteen billion dollars

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Speaker 1: last year, yes, and five billion the year before. So

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Speaker 1: that's a three times as much money in a year.

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Speaker 1: That's bad news. Here's the caveat to that sixteen billion

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Speaker 1: dollar loss, though, eleven billion of that was in payments

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Speaker 1: to uh, the future benefits of postal workers that have

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Speaker 1: not yet retired. But well, and the posts serve. The

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Speaker 1: Postal Service is the only federal agency of any sort

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Speaker 1: that is required to prepay its employees benefits for the future.

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Speaker 1: In two thousand and six, a lamed accession of Congress said,

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Speaker 1: you know what, you guys need to make sure that

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Speaker 1: your workers are taken care of. So you guys have

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Speaker 1: to start pre paying um and over the next ten years.

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Speaker 1: And they have been, and they've been bleeding money. I mean,

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Speaker 1: like a sixteen billion dollar loss, but eleven billion of

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Speaker 1: it was to these future payments. I guess that would

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Speaker 1: make sense. Then then if you took out that eleven

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Speaker 1: they would just be about the same loss as before,

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Speaker 1: a mere five billion a year, right, But and that's

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Speaker 1: a lot of money to lose, it is, but um

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Speaker 1: they're figuring out ways to make up for that extra loss,

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Speaker 1: and one of the big ones it's on the table

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Speaker 1: now is cutting out Saturday delivery. They figured they can

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Speaker 1: recoup two billion dollars a year by doing that, so

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Speaker 1: then they're down to three. The thing is is the

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Speaker 1: post the post office. It's a part of the executive branch. Man,

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Speaker 1: it's all over the place. It's a part of the

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Speaker 1: executive branch. It's a part of the federal government. But

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Speaker 1: it gets zero dollars in tax revenue. And it's also

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Speaker 1: a thrill kill cult, right exactly. That's the horrible secret

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Speaker 1: of the US. Right. Um. So they get no money

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Speaker 1: besides what they can make off of their own revenue corporation. Right. Um,

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Speaker 1: So they get no but they get but they're also

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Speaker 1: under the purview of the federal the federal government. It's

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Speaker 1: a weird, weird thing, and they can't act without asking Congress.

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Speaker 1: And Congress hasn't exactly been forthcoming lately. They haven't approved

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Speaker 1: the Saturday thinget have they Congress. Here's the thing they've

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Speaker 1: been trying to get Congress throughpprove that forever. The Senate

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Speaker 1: passed a bill that said, after two years, we'll let

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Speaker 1: you cut out Saturday service, will give you eleven billion

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Speaker 1: dollars in over payments. That you guys made towards the

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Speaker 1: retirement stuff, all this stuff back that went to the House,

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Speaker 1: and the House didn't do anything with it. Right, So

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Speaker 1: you know the fiscal cliff, Well, the the US Congress

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Speaker 1: passed the stop gap measure, basically a federal budget that says,

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Speaker 1: within this period, we're still able to operate, right, And

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Speaker 1: the USPS says, ha ha, you didn't include our mandate

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Speaker 1: from nineteen one that we have to carry out Saturday

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Speaker 1: service in that stop gap. So technically, under current federal law,

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Speaker 1: we don't have to carry out Saturday service. And they're

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Speaker 1: arguing it legally, so they're just saying that's the loophold

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Speaker 1: are going to use to shut down Saturday service. Sack medicines,

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Speaker 1: just packages. They're going to deliver packages on Saturday. And

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Speaker 1: here's a really good reason. Express mail. They're revenues from

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Speaker 1: packages of increased over the last ten years, whereas first

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Speaker 1: class mail, you know, letters have gone down, I believe.

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Speaker 1: So they're making all almost all of their money because

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Speaker 1: it's only forty cents to mail a letter from Florida

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Speaker 1: to Hawaii. Um. But they make, however much shipping in

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Speaker 1: the shipping game, which is where they make all their money,

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Speaker 1: which is ironically the one place they don't have a

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Speaker 1: monopoly as far as the mail goes. I'm glad to

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Speaker 1: see medicine mail order medicine on that list to express

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Speaker 1: mail packages in medicine, because at first I was like,

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Speaker 1: who cares, I don't need you don't yet. I don't

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Speaker 1: need my mail on a Saturday, right, but you need

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Speaker 1: your medicine on a Saturday, or else you go blind.

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Speaker 1: That's why they included that as a you know something,

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Speaker 1: they would still deliver, right and post offices that are

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Speaker 1: already open on Saturdays will still be open on Saturdays.

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Speaker 1: So if you want to go to your PO box,

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Speaker 1: maybe there'll be some mail, maybe there won't be who knows,

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Speaker 1: I bet you've had a PO box. I've been thinking

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Speaker 1: about this, haven't you have? You know, you just struck

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Speaker 1: me as a kind of person that would have had

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Speaker 1: a PO box at one point. You know, that's where

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Speaker 1: I get all my guns in the mail. So, UM,

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Speaker 1: I'm pretty worked up about this, as you can see. Um,

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Speaker 1: it's kind of interesting. And who would have thought that

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Speaker 1: the postal service would ever be interesting? Uh? Sure, I

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Speaker 1: think parts of this are very interesting. Um, and we

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Speaker 1: would just want to go ahead and say hello to

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Speaker 1: all of our postal carriers out there that um listen

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Speaker 1: to our show who who wont us over during the

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Speaker 1: Bush Era? Because we've got an emails from you guys

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Speaker 1: and gals. Yeah, including one of our favorite people out

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Speaker 1: there is a postal worker, very nostrim. Oh yeah, this

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Speaker 1: one should really be a tribute to Van Nostris. I

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Speaker 1: didn't he's a carrier. I'm he's always been kind of

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Speaker 1: cryptic about what he does. But I'm under the distinct

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Speaker 1: impression that he's employed by the Postal Service. A right,

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Speaker 1: Bangalore's Van Nostrian. Yeah, this is for you. Um, But okay,

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Speaker 1: so let's talk about this. Let's talk about the Postal

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Speaker 1: service man. I'm all jazzed about the USPS. Dude, glad

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Speaker 1: you are. Um. So, for a little while, even after

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Speaker 1: the advent of electronic mail, the postal services, the amount

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Speaker 1: of mail they were delivering was still increasing. As of

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Speaker 1: two thousand seven, it was on an upward trajectory. Sorry,

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Speaker 1: two thousand six, right, two hundred and thirteen billion, one

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Speaker 1: hundred and thirty seven million pieces of mail that year. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's down to one sixty seven now and then Uh,

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Speaker 1: their when was this written? Do you know? I think

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Speaker 1: two thousand seven eight. Okay, so then they had seven

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Speaker 1: hundred thousand employees. Now they have about five hundred and

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Speaker 1: eighty thousand. So they've been in and trim the budget

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Speaker 1: mode I think for the past few years. Well, and

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Speaker 1: the reason why. In two thousand and six they also

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Speaker 1: made seventy two point eight billion dollars. I mean those

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Speaker 1: stamps they add up, you know. Um, in two thousand

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Speaker 1: and eleven they made sixty six billion. Wow. Not bad. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: but they're still losing a lot of money. I mean

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Speaker 1: that's what seven billion dollars in difference in just five years. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's not good. It's not good. Um So, where the

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Speaker 1: where'd all this come from? Chuck? It came from back

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Speaker 1: yonder day. You know. People have always need to communicate,

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Speaker 1: obviously from long distances. And uh in sixteen thirty nine, Um,

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Speaker 1: they you know, colonists here in the in the New

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Speaker 1: I guess they weren't United States yet, but in the

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Speaker 1: New World needed to get word back to England occasionally

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Speaker 1: and say things like hey, quit bugging us, or hey,

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Speaker 1: sind it's more t and crumpets and um. So the

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Speaker 1: first official postal service was established in sixteen thirty nine. UM.

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Speaker 1: Richard Fairbank's tavern in Boston was the official mail drop

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Speaker 1: for overseas there in Massachusetts, and that was the place

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Speaker 1: to go if you wanted to mail something. Yeah, and

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Speaker 1: I couldn't find what happened or where it went on

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Speaker 1: the other side of the Atlantic. Probably I would imagine

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Speaker 1: then you just went to that pub and said, hey,

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Speaker 1: is there any mail? And they said no, and you

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Speaker 1: turn around and traveled the five miles back to your village.

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Speaker 1: So that was step one. Step two was about uh forty.

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Speaker 1: So nine years later three William penn established very famous

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Speaker 1: person obviously um, the first official post office in penn Sylvania.

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Speaker 1: He give his name after him. That's right, and uh,

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Speaker 1: I love this side note. Here in the South, private

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Speaker 1: messages were just sent between plantations, so they would probably

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Speaker 1: just give it to a slave and say carry this

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Speaker 1: over to that guy. Uh. And then flash forward a

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Speaker 1: little bit more. Um, the British Crown gave to a

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Speaker 1: man named Thomas Neil a twenty one year grant for

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Speaker 1: the postal service in the United States, and he paid

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Speaker 1: UM like seven seven shillings a year. So that's nothing, right,

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Speaker 1: he still died in debt with the monopoly. So the

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Speaker 1: postal service has always been kind of tricky to call

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Speaker 1: money from. Interesting. So that continued until seventeen seventy four,

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Speaker 1: and a lot of big stuff was happening around that time, like, Hey,

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Speaker 1: we don't like you anymore in England controlling us over

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Speaker 1: here and taxing us. So we're gonna start and establish

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Speaker 1: our own constitutional post office for for any kind of

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Speaker 1: mail going from anywhere, basically intercolonial mail. Yeah. Yeah, it

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Speaker 1: was just was very cutting edge at that time, I'm sure.

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Speaker 1: And actually, um, you know that when the British were

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Speaker 1: carrying out the postal service on behalf of the colonies.

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Speaker 1: In the colonies, um, there was a guy named Benjamin

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Speaker 1: Franklin who was appointed the postmaster of Philadelphia and he

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Speaker 1: actually killed it as postmaster, of course he did. He

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Speaker 1: like totally improved the road. He said, like, we're gonna

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Speaker 1: start working like twenty four hours a day. We're gonna

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Speaker 1: have like lots of shifts, we're going to put up

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Speaker 1: milestones like the The postal service helped improve the connectedness

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Speaker 1: of the colonies thanks to him. So when the Continental

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Speaker 1: Congress said, hey, we want our own Postal Service. Ben

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Speaker 1: Franklin became the first Postmaster General, and of course he

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Speaker 1: ran it like a tight ship. And he's one of

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Speaker 1: those dudes. I get a feeling if we could like

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Speaker 1: resurrect him and bring him out today, he could fix

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Speaker 1: what's going on in this country. Yeah, and he'd say

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Speaker 1: something pithy and ask for a glass of sherry exactly. Um.

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Speaker 1: So this is to me when it gets super interesting. Uh,

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Speaker 1: was in the nineteenth century when westward expansion happened California

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Speaker 1: gold Rush. All of a sudden, we needed to get

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Speaker 1: stuff from the East coast to San Francisco, let's say,

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Speaker 1: so as quick as possible, right, what's crazy? As quick

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Speaker 1: as possible was to go down New York around Florida, yes,

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Speaker 1: like a steamship, uh, through the Caribbean and then across

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Speaker 1: like Panama and then up on the Pacific side to California.

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Speaker 1: That was the fastest way to get mail for a while. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And how long three to four weeks to send a

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Speaker 1: letter from the East coast to the West coast. And

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Speaker 1: that's you know, the best case scenario, right, And that's

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Speaker 1: how that's what that's how the US the East coast

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Speaker 1: um communicated with the West Coast for a while. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: until some stagecoach routes. Routes were um, we're established. There

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Speaker 1: was a southern route and there was a central route,

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Speaker 1: and the Southern route you could supposedly use a year

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Speaker 1: round because it's lovely down here. But then the Central

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Speaker 1: route it was faster, but they said you can't use

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Speaker 1: that year round their storms. Yeah, and it also killed me. Man.

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Speaker 1: The way they used to name companies back then was

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Speaker 1: so like it made perfect sense. You basically just said

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Speaker 1: what you did. Like one the Pacific Mail Steamship Company

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Speaker 1: said we're going to carry your mail to the Pacific

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Speaker 1: by steamship, and then the Overland Mail Company like, well,

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Speaker 1: we're gonna do it over land, so that's what we're

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Speaker 1: gonna call our company. So they got the contract the

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Speaker 1: Overland Mail Company. Um, along the Southern route. Took about

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Speaker 1: twenty five days, and then my favorite, one of my

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Speaker 1: favorite parts of American history was born, the Pony Express. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and it's just so amazing, like the the idea that

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Speaker 1: they had to do this. It was a different company

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Speaker 1: that was competing. They wanted to get that contract away

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Speaker 1: from the Overlink Company, right the CEOC and p P.

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Speaker 1: And they said, you know what, we know the central

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Speaker 1: route shorter. We're gonna prove that we can use a

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Speaker 1: year round and we're gonna set up something that it's

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Speaker 1: just gonna blow this twenty five day thing out of

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Speaker 1: the water. And they set up the Pony Express and

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Speaker 1: they had stations what every ten twenty miles, and a

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Speaker 1: rider would ride from St. Joseph, Missouri to Sacramento or

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Speaker 1: be part of a line of rides. Well, yeah, that's

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Speaker 1: the key. They go about a hundred miles and then

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Speaker 1: they change horses every like ten or fifteen miles. Yes,

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Speaker 1: so the same rider would change horses because they rode.

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Speaker 1: They average ten miles an hour, which doesn't sound fast,

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Speaker 1: but you got a factor in like the Sierra Nevadas

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Speaker 1: where they're just crawling up these mountains. So these dudes

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Speaker 1: were riding hard and on flat ground. If they're averaging

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Speaker 1: ten miles an hour, right, and they're going twenty four

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Speaker 1: hours a day, uh, they're going two thousand miles ten

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Speaker 1: miles an hour, that's what twenty hours? Yeah, that's no,

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Speaker 1: that's two hundred hours. So what is that That's less

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Speaker 1: than ten days. So that's that cuts that over link

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Speaker 1: company's rate by Yeah, there was always one set of

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Speaker 1: writers going east, one set going west. Yeah. I think

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Speaker 1: when you when you were relieved by another rider, you'd

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Speaker 1: hang out at that station and wait for the other

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Speaker 1: for somebody to come the other way and then relieve them. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: They were paid really well at the time five bucks

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Speaker 1: a week, which at the time unskilled labors made about

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Speaker 1: a dollar a week. So um, and did you read

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Speaker 1: the first ad they ever put in? Wanted young, skinny,

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Speaker 1: wiry fellows not over eighteen, must be expert writers willing

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Speaker 1: to risk death daily. Orphans preferred, And that's maybe legend,

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Speaker 1: but supposedly that's what it says. But apparently they were young, little,

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Speaker 1: light lithe, skinny kids because you know, you didn't want

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Speaker 1: some big dude like me up on a horse. The

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Speaker 1: horse would be like, I don't want to ride anymore.

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Speaker 1: So they were like these young boys, like I think

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Speaker 1: the youngest one is like fourteen. And supposedly Buffalo Bill

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Speaker 1: Cody was a rider, although people have disputed that. Now.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, well he's he's the stuff of a legend. Well,

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Speaker 1: he's by far and away the most famous famous Pony

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Speaker 1: Express rider, if in fact he did. But anyway, so

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Speaker 1: so think about the amount of infrastructure built up along

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Speaker 1: this central route to have a station every ten or

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Speaker 1: twenty miles. You've got all these employees going. And they

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Speaker 1: proved it. They proved that the central route could be

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Speaker 1: used year round, and so they got the contract. Then

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Speaker 1: right now, the Overland Company got the contract to use it,

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Speaker 1: to use that same route that was already established. And

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Speaker 1: the Pony Express was like, you have to be kidding me.

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Speaker 1: And so the the U. S. Government said no, no,

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Speaker 1: you guys do half and then let the let the

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Speaker 1: Overland Company do the other half. Yeah, And they were

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Speaker 1: mad for about a year and a half and really angry.

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Speaker 1: And then the telegraph line was completed. Now everyone's like, oh, well,

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Speaker 1: I guess I guess we're all out of business now. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: That was it. Pony Express the soul the Wells Fargo

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Speaker 1: and basically shut down. Yeah. I think American Express ended

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Speaker 1: up branching out of Wells Fargo to like these are

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Speaker 1: old old companies, like these modern banks and credit card companies.

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Speaker 1: Is interesting how far they go back. But think about

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Speaker 1: that man. Even as far back as the mid nineteenth century,

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Speaker 1: new technology was putting mail delivery out to pasture, and

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Speaker 1: then mail delivery would evolve and like figure out how

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Speaker 1: to come back. Yeah, that's pretty cool. Foreshadowing. So this

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Speaker 1: is a big jump forward to the mid nineteen sixties. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: a lot happened in between. Then it didn't. Actually, we

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Speaker 1: started to go move further and further out into the suburbs.

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Speaker 1: There was a huge population boom in the in the

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Speaker 1: post war era, and businesses started to realize the value

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Speaker 1: of direct mailing. And all these factors put together meant

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Speaker 1: that the postal Service was totally overwhelmed. Yeah, completely, because

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Speaker 1: it became such a big deal. Everyone was writing letters

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Speaker 1: and they were using the same old hand um, I

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Speaker 1: guess hand delivery methods, sorting methods, that's what it was.

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Speaker 1: They weren't automated at all, and they needed to be.

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Speaker 1: And so there was a postal reform that that was undertaken. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and this was in nineteen seventy one the Post Office Department.

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Speaker 1: And I didn't even know this. It was shortly after

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Speaker 1: I was born. We weren't the United States Postal Service

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Speaker 1: until nine that was when we officially became the USPS. UH,

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Speaker 1: it became an independent establishment. Um was no longer a

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Speaker 1: part of the cabinet of the federal government, but was

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Speaker 1: part of the executive branch and got the monopoly basically

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Speaker 1: to deliver mail, even though it was supposedly just a company,

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Speaker 1: and they and they re up the mandate from I

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Speaker 1: think Sevo that said you the postal Service is one

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Speaker 1: of the most essential services of the federal government. No

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Speaker 1: person has cut off in this country. None shall not

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Speaker 1: get delivered exactly. Everyone's going to have a mailbox, and

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Speaker 1: everyone's going to get mail to that mailbox every day

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Speaker 1: because we need to help keep intellectual freedom um going

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Speaker 1: and and and ideas in business and commerce going all

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Speaker 1: the time. And the Postal Services, this federal agency that

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Speaker 1: carries that out, and that I'm sure that put a

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Speaker 1: financial burden on them when people started building in these

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Speaker 1: especially rich people, when they started building in these remote areas,

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Speaker 1: because then all of a sudden, you had to add

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Speaker 1: that to your route. Well, there's if it's sixty miles

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Speaker 1: up a mountain and it's the only house there's there's

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Speaker 1: a guy who services the Grand Canyon. There's a group

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Speaker 1: of Indians that live at the bottom of the Grand Canyon,

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Speaker 1: and he has a donkey train that goes down there

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Speaker 1: every day with the mail. Really yeah, I mean it's

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Speaker 1: part of it's a federal mandate. You have to be

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Speaker 1: able to get mail. Everyone has a mailbox. He's like,

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Speaker 1: don't you guys you smoke signals? Come on, they do.

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Speaker 1: In fact, that actually wrote an article on spoke singles. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I was gonna say we should podcasts on it, but

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Speaker 1: it's it's like super basic, is it really? It would

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Speaker 1: be like a five minute podcast. Well, we'll have to

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Speaker 1: figure out some other way to use it. Agreed, because

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Speaker 1: that's interesting. Um, so do we cover going postal now?

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Speaker 1: It was sort of just thrown in the middle of

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Speaker 1: this army. Yeah, it really was. It was talking about

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Speaker 1: how packages are delivered, and all of a sudden, it says,

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Speaker 1: and then people started killing each other in nine six yeah,

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Speaker 1: which is actually, Um, the post Office has the dubious

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Speaker 1: distinction of kicking off the workplace shooting trend in the

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Speaker 1: United States. Was that the first one as far as

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Speaker 1: I could tell, Alright, So Edmund Oklahoma, Patrick Henry A.

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Speaker 1: Cheryl killed fourteen co workers. Um. And another one happened,

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Speaker 1: including a uh supervisor getting killed with a samurai sword. UM.

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Speaker 1: November nineteen Thomas H. McIlvaine shot and killed four co workers,

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Speaker 1: wounded five others, then shot himself and then nine and

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Speaker 1: then in two thousand three two more incidences of postal

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Speaker 1: workers killing fellow postal workers. It was like just between

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Speaker 1: eighties six and nineties seven, forty people died at postal

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Speaker 1: post offices from postal rampage and gave birth to the

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Speaker 1: term going postal, which is used as a vernacular for

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Speaker 1: like just losing it basically, um. And if you're interested

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Speaker 1: in that at all, there's a really good documentary I

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Speaker 1: think it's on Netflix streaming right now called um Murdered

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Speaker 1: by Proxy, and it's all about the postal shootings, like

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Speaker 1: where they came from. There's a lot of scrutiny at

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Speaker 1: like the of the management techniques of people at post offices,

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Speaker 1: and there's got to be something to it. I mean,

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Speaker 1: oh yeah, if you watch that's like it was like

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Speaker 1: how many other industries had that many office shootings? You know, retail, actually,

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Speaker 1: you're the homicide rate is three times higher in retail

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Speaker 1: than it is at the post office. You don't say

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Speaker 1: go in retail, that just means you're going shopping. Well,

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Speaker 1: it's like drinking the kool aid. They really drank flavor

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Speaker 1: aid and it's right kool aids some one with that distinction.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, alright, so that was going. Yeah, I mean

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Speaker 1: we had to mention it, but I don't want to

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Speaker 1: dwell on it. But it was weird in this article

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Speaker 1: the way it went right in the middle of this

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Speaker 1: came up out of nowhere. Um zip codes, this is

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Speaker 1: kind of cool. Um zip codes were introduced in nineteen

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Speaker 1: sixty three and then officially put in place in mandatory

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Speaker 1: in seven because just so much mail going on you

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Speaker 1: had to categorize it more specifically, right, that was part

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Speaker 1: of that, the post office being swamped. This was the

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Speaker 1: first step toward automation. Was like a standardized code. Well

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Speaker 1: they did have other ones, but it was like one

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Speaker 1: was New York City or something like that. You know.

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Speaker 1: So ZIP this is just a nice little cocktail party

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Speaker 1: factoid stands for zone improvement plan. I never knew that

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Speaker 1: until I read this. Did you know that I had before?

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Speaker 1: But I had forgotten. Okay, so it's his own improvement

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Speaker 1: plan and it's uh here in the United States at least,

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Speaker 1: it's a five digit number represents you know, a location

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Speaker 1: obviously where you're trying to send something and it now

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Speaker 1: they have the ZIP code plus four in some areas

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Speaker 1: of like I guess major urban areas have a little

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Speaker 1: more specificity, right, they like deliver it to your like

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Speaker 1: they put it on your stomach if you plus four.

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Speaker 1: I think certain buildings even will have their own plus

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Speaker 1: four if it's a big enough building, or if you

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Speaker 1: get a lot of mail as a person, is that

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Speaker 1: what you're after is a plus four for your well,

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Speaker 1: it says that some high volume mail receivers get it.

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Speaker 1: I'm like, you know, if it was cool mail, I'd

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Speaker 1: love to get the mail. UM. So the first digit

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Speaker 1: there represents the state here in Georgia, that's a three. UM.

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Speaker 1: It increases as you move west, and there are some

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Speaker 1: states that share each digit. Yeah, like two. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: taken up by a lot of states. There's the District

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Speaker 1: of Columbia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia.

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Speaker 1: Man all two's. I would be mad if I lived

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Speaker 1: in one of those states. So then you got the

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Speaker 1: second third digits. Those are regions within the state. UM.

424
00:23:17,160 --> 00:23:20,920
Speaker 1: The first three of those create what's called the SCF code,

425
00:23:20,960 --> 00:23:25,520
Speaker 1: the sectional center, facility, and UM. Then the fourth and

426
00:23:25,600 --> 00:23:29,600
Speaker 1: fifth digits are even more specific. Basically, it just hones

427
00:23:29,680 --> 00:23:32,959
Speaker 1: down as you go left or right until you've got

428
00:23:33,200 --> 00:23:37,000
Speaker 1: Josh Clark's house right, like this state, this section facility,

429
00:23:37,440 --> 00:23:41,720
Speaker 1: this UM post office, yeah, this neighborhood yeah, and then

430
00:23:41,760 --> 00:23:45,120
Speaker 1: this maybe this building, this high volume mail receiver named

431
00:23:45,200 --> 00:23:48,720
Speaker 1: Josh Clark. That's right. Um, So you've got the zip

432
00:23:48,720 --> 00:23:51,240
Speaker 1: code that allowed automation. And a little known fact is

433
00:23:51,320 --> 00:23:55,040
Speaker 1: the US Postal Service doesn't just handle a ton of

434
00:23:55,080 --> 00:23:58,080
Speaker 1: the US as mail. It handles of all of the

435
00:23:58,119 --> 00:24:01,720
Speaker 1: mail in the world. Really yeah wow, So before the

436
00:24:01,800 --> 00:24:05,120
Speaker 1: zip code, this was really difficult. It also went from

437
00:24:05,160 --> 00:24:07,639
Speaker 1: if you're mailing something from New York to San Francisco,

438
00:24:08,200 --> 00:24:12,359
Speaker 1: it went through every distribution facility in the country in

439
00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:16,840
Speaker 1: between New York and San Francisco. Um before it got there.

440
00:24:17,160 --> 00:24:20,439
Speaker 1: Really yes, Now zip codes, Well, let's talk about how

441
00:24:20,480 --> 00:24:23,000
Speaker 1: what a letter does, and this is all thanks to

442
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:26,239
Speaker 1: zip codes. So I write a little love letter, I'm

443
00:24:26,240 --> 00:24:29,919
Speaker 1: gonna mail it to Emily, which is weird because we

444
00:24:29,960 --> 00:24:33,800
Speaker 1: live together. Just be a romantic. That's actually a great

445
00:24:33,840 --> 00:24:37,359
Speaker 1: example though, because you can mail something from your mailbox

446
00:24:37,440 --> 00:24:40,200
Speaker 1: to be delivered back to you. I reckon, I've never

447
00:24:40,240 --> 00:24:45,040
Speaker 1: done it. That's a that's a the poor man's trademark

448
00:24:45,880 --> 00:24:48,160
Speaker 1: I've heard about that is to mail something to yourself

449
00:24:48,160 --> 00:24:54,080
Speaker 1: into this. I think it depends on the judge. Yeah. Probably. Okay,

450
00:24:54,560 --> 00:24:57,280
Speaker 1: So you put it in your mailbox. Postal carriers gonna

451
00:24:57,359 --> 00:25:00,359
Speaker 1: pick it up. They're gonna take it to the post office. Um,

452
00:25:00,359 --> 00:25:02,120
Speaker 1: they're gonna put it on a truck and then take

453
00:25:02,240 --> 00:25:05,240
Speaker 1: that from the post office to a processing plant where

454
00:25:05,800 --> 00:25:09,600
Speaker 1: we have our long awaited machines doing some sorting, shape

455
00:25:09,640 --> 00:25:12,680
Speaker 1: and size. Yeah. Well, first they sort everything out and

456
00:25:12,720 --> 00:25:16,520
Speaker 1: make sure everything's facing the right way up right. Um.

457
00:25:16,600 --> 00:25:22,000
Speaker 1: And then the the they packages, well, packages are put

458
00:25:22,000 --> 00:25:25,240
Speaker 1: on one one belt and then letters are put in another.

459
00:25:25,520 --> 00:25:27,439
Speaker 1: And there the letters say, let's just stick with the

460
00:25:27,520 --> 00:25:30,280
Speaker 1: letter that you wrote. Okay. Uh it's it goes into

461
00:25:30,320 --> 00:25:33,880
Speaker 1: a slot so it's facing upwards and upright. Yeah if

462
00:25:34,119 --> 00:25:37,919
Speaker 1: if front words and upright. And then they put a

463
00:25:37,960 --> 00:25:41,359
Speaker 1: little barcode on the back of the letter and uh

464
00:25:41,440 --> 00:25:43,879
Speaker 1: I think ultra violet ink. Yeah. Well, first thing it

465
00:25:43,920 --> 00:25:47,360
Speaker 1: does is it gets a postmark and cancelation line saying basically,

466
00:25:47,600 --> 00:25:50,760
Speaker 1: you can't use the stamp again. Yeah. Don't even try it.

467
00:25:50,760 --> 00:25:52,879
Speaker 1: Don't be cheap. We've seen the wide out tricks. We've

468
00:25:52,920 --> 00:25:56,280
Speaker 1: seen doctoring up a stamp, which is probably a federal offense.

469
00:25:56,320 --> 00:25:59,280
Speaker 1: It probably is UM. And then so after that the

470
00:25:59,320 --> 00:26:01,280
Speaker 1: barcodes in it on the back of the piece of mail.

471
00:26:01,720 --> 00:26:04,480
Speaker 1: And then there's an optical scanner that reads the address,

472
00:26:04,640 --> 00:26:08,000
Speaker 1: which is pretty cool. And if you if they're really

473
00:26:08,160 --> 00:26:13,240
Speaker 1: really really accurate to UM, but if your handwriting is terrible,

474
00:26:13,560 --> 00:26:16,600
Speaker 1: they have a new system now where the this UM

475
00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:20,080
Speaker 1: conveyor belt takes a picture of it, send emails a

476
00:26:20,119 --> 00:26:23,520
Speaker 1: picture to a human being at a computer who reads

477
00:26:23,520 --> 00:26:26,280
Speaker 1: it what I think it is, types it in and

478
00:26:26,320 --> 00:26:28,399
Speaker 1: then it's so it stays on the line. It doesn't

479
00:26:28,400 --> 00:26:32,560
Speaker 1: have to come out any longer. It's pretty much technology. Yeah. UM.

480
00:26:32,640 --> 00:26:36,000
Speaker 1: And then so based on this UM this address, including

481
00:26:36,000 --> 00:26:39,040
Speaker 1: the ZIP code, it prints a barcode at the bottom.

482
00:26:39,080 --> 00:26:40,760
Speaker 1: If you look at a letter, any letter you get

483
00:26:41,040 --> 00:26:44,040
Speaker 1: has a little barcode on it. And so that's what's red.

484
00:26:44,600 --> 00:26:47,240
Speaker 1: That's right that the thing on the back is invisible.

485
00:26:47,280 --> 00:26:51,000
Speaker 1: I think right, it's fluorescent. That's just showing off. We

486
00:26:51,040 --> 00:26:54,919
Speaker 1: have invisible link. Other processing machines then read those barcodes

487
00:26:55,480 --> 00:26:58,000
Speaker 1: and then sort them in their little bins according to

488
00:26:58,080 --> 00:27:01,879
Speaker 1: zip code. And it's just basically placing everything and what

489
00:27:02,000 --> 00:27:06,160
Speaker 1: will eventually be a trade that will be delivered back

490
00:27:06,200 --> 00:27:10,680
Speaker 1: to a post office or a sorting facility or does

491
00:27:10,720 --> 00:27:13,800
Speaker 1: it go straight to a post office? UM, it goes

492
00:27:13,960 --> 00:27:18,160
Speaker 1: to another processing plant, right, So imagine each processing plant

493
00:27:18,359 --> 00:27:20,760
Speaker 1: regional I guess, has a bunch of mail coming in

494
00:27:21,119 --> 00:27:24,119
Speaker 1: on trucks. Then it sorts and then sends out and

495
00:27:24,160 --> 00:27:27,680
Speaker 1: then based on its zip code that it serves UM,

496
00:27:28,080 --> 00:27:31,760
Speaker 1: it gets a bunch of flats from other UM distribution

497
00:27:31,800 --> 00:27:34,560
Speaker 1: facilities that's right with that are already according to the

498
00:27:34,640 --> 00:27:37,960
Speaker 1: zip code. So let's say it's getting a flat of

499
00:27:38,160 --> 00:27:42,360
Speaker 1: mail by zip code. It then also sorts through those

500
00:27:42,760 --> 00:27:46,600
Speaker 1: that's right, and it actually sorts them into an individual

501
00:27:46,680 --> 00:27:51,440
Speaker 1: carriers route in order, and that's what's delivered to the

502
00:27:51,480 --> 00:27:54,720
Speaker 1: post office. So it arrives at the post office ready

503
00:27:54,760 --> 00:27:58,440
Speaker 1: to go on the truck. Yes, okay, And that doesn't

504
00:27:58,440 --> 00:28:00,679
Speaker 1: mean that the postal worker doesn't have much to do.

505
00:28:00,720 --> 00:28:05,040
Speaker 1: They also still have like circulars, magazines, bulk mail. They

506
00:28:05,080 --> 00:28:07,240
Speaker 1: have to go through and put it for every address,

507
00:28:07,280 --> 00:28:09,520
Speaker 1: all that crapped it and where all that my recycling

508
00:28:09,560 --> 00:28:13,480
Speaker 1: ben basically yeah, although the coupons. I'll remember our junk

509
00:28:13,560 --> 00:28:16,240
Speaker 1: mail episode from years and years back, and we've got

510
00:28:16,400 --> 00:28:18,520
Speaker 1: so much from people who are like, no, no, no,

511
00:28:18,560 --> 00:28:20,480
Speaker 1: you can't get rid of junk mail, right, that's the

512
00:28:20,480 --> 00:28:51,160
Speaker 1: only thing keeping us in business. So if you're going

513
00:28:51,200 --> 00:28:53,560
Speaker 1: to address a letter, there are a few guidelines. You know.

514
00:28:53,600 --> 00:28:55,920
Speaker 1: You gotta put your address legibly on the front. You

515
00:28:55,960 --> 00:28:59,120
Speaker 1: gotta put your little return address in the upper left corner. Yeah,

516
00:28:59,120 --> 00:29:01,160
Speaker 1: on the front, don't put it on the back, upper

517
00:29:01,200 --> 00:29:04,520
Speaker 1: left corner there. And don't use periods in commas, like

518
00:29:04,560 --> 00:29:06,719
Speaker 1: if you write p O box it's not p period

519
00:29:06,760 --> 00:29:12,040
Speaker 1: oh period, Although that doesn't matter. Apparently it allows for

520
00:29:12,080 --> 00:29:15,280
Speaker 1: greater efficiency in reading your letter, maybe because I always

521
00:29:15,320 --> 00:29:18,120
Speaker 1: put like Atlanta comma g A period. I do too,

522
00:29:18,120 --> 00:29:20,040
Speaker 1: and they still get there. But don't you wonder if

523
00:29:20,080 --> 00:29:23,240
Speaker 1: they get there like earlier? I don't know. Maybe, so

524
00:29:24,040 --> 00:29:27,440
Speaker 1: uh it is um, Supposedly you need to be able

525
00:29:27,520 --> 00:29:30,800
Speaker 1: to read the address at arms length, so don't write tiny,

526
00:29:31,440 --> 00:29:34,520
Speaker 1: and uh, don't write so big that they can't do

527
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:37,600
Speaker 1: other things to the envelope like scan and stamp and

528
00:29:37,640 --> 00:29:41,240
Speaker 1: things like that. Um. And then you know, you gotta

529
00:29:41,240 --> 00:29:43,280
Speaker 1: put your return address because if something happens, you want

530
00:29:43,280 --> 00:29:45,960
Speaker 1: it to come back to you. Although I don't do

531
00:29:46,000 --> 00:29:47,560
Speaker 1: that much anymore, A lot of times I'll just put

532
00:29:47,600 --> 00:29:50,640
Speaker 1: like Atlanta, Georgia. Really, you don't put your return address

533
00:29:50,640 --> 00:29:52,400
Speaker 1: on there. No, but I rarely mail things, and a

534
00:29:52,400 --> 00:29:53,920
Speaker 1: lot of times when I do, it's for work, So

535
00:29:53,960 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 1: I'll just put, you know, Atlanta, Georgia, houstaff works or something.

536
00:29:57,440 --> 00:29:59,320
Speaker 1: And it's not the kind of thing that if it

537
00:29:59,360 --> 00:30:01,720
Speaker 1: doesn't come back to me, I would care. I got

538
00:30:01,800 --> 00:30:03,920
Speaker 1: I've had some precious thing. I would put a Richard address.

539
00:30:04,000 --> 00:30:05,280
Speaker 1: I have a feeling that you're going to get some

540
00:30:05,320 --> 00:30:07,880
Speaker 1: email from postal carriers that are like I hate people

541
00:30:07,920 --> 00:30:11,040
Speaker 1: like you, because whether you care if it comes back

542
00:30:11,040 --> 00:30:12,520
Speaker 1: to you or not, I'm sure they have to get

543
00:30:12,520 --> 00:30:16,360
Speaker 1: it back to you. Uh. There's a lot of type

544
00:30:16,400 --> 00:30:20,120
Speaker 1: of delivery surfaces we surfaces services. We won't go over here,

545
00:30:20,680 --> 00:30:22,720
Speaker 1: but I did want to say that media mail is

546
00:30:22,840 --> 00:30:26,680
Speaker 1: a great little ah trick, not a trick, but a

547
00:30:26,720 --> 00:30:30,600
Speaker 1: great tool if you're mailing things like books and or

548
00:30:31,400 --> 00:30:35,080
Speaker 1: DVDs because it's super cheap, but it takes a while.

549
00:30:35,240 --> 00:30:38,240
Speaker 1: But that's part of that mandate from that. They want

550
00:30:38,280 --> 00:30:41,080
Speaker 1: to keep the intellectual juice of America flowing through the

551
00:30:41,120 --> 00:30:44,840
Speaker 1: Postal Service, so things like that creative stuff for books

552
00:30:44,920 --> 00:30:49,200
Speaker 1: or correspondence, like and I think that's how if you've

553
00:30:49,200 --> 00:30:52,120
Speaker 1: ever ordered a book on Amazon for like two cents,

554
00:30:52,600 --> 00:30:54,040
Speaker 1: you're like, oh, how can they sell a book for

555
00:30:54,080 --> 00:30:57,760
Speaker 1: two cents, It's because they charge you like four for shipping,

556
00:30:58,400 --> 00:31:01,120
Speaker 1: and they probably pay like eight cents to mail it

557
00:31:01,240 --> 00:31:04,880
Speaker 1: with media mail. That's the greatest scam of the century.

558
00:31:05,040 --> 00:31:06,840
Speaker 1: Well not really, I mean they're making their money via

559
00:31:06,880 --> 00:31:10,200
Speaker 1: shipping instead of the book itself. But publishers don't like it,

560
00:31:10,240 --> 00:31:12,800
Speaker 1: of course, because they want to sell their books new

561
00:31:13,200 --> 00:31:17,600
Speaker 1: and not for two cents on Amazon. So. Um, I

562
00:31:17,640 --> 00:31:20,880
Speaker 1: think we said that the Postal Service has a monopoly

563
00:31:21,160 --> 00:31:25,920
Speaker 1: on delivering mail but not on delivering packages, right, Um,

564
00:31:25,960 --> 00:31:28,720
Speaker 1: so because they're kind of in competitive business against like

565
00:31:28,800 --> 00:31:32,320
Speaker 1: UPS and FedEx and d h L and all those guys. Um,

566
00:31:32,480 --> 00:31:35,920
Speaker 1: those guys have gone ahead and in and invested in

567
00:31:36,040 --> 00:31:39,880
Speaker 1: infrastructure of say like air delivery, air transportation of mail,

568
00:31:40,280 --> 00:31:42,960
Speaker 1: and the U. The Postal Service has tried that before,

569
00:31:43,320 --> 00:31:46,240
Speaker 1: like they tried a guided missile in ninety three, which

570
00:31:46,280 --> 00:31:48,680
Speaker 1: they shot full of mail from a submarine to a

571
00:31:48,840 --> 00:31:52,120
Speaker 1: naval station in Florida, but it was just too expensive.

572
00:31:52,880 --> 00:31:55,880
Speaker 1: So the Postal Service said, hey, Ups, Hey FedEx, you

573
00:31:55,920 --> 00:31:59,120
Speaker 1: guys have a bunch of planes. Can we start putting

574
00:31:59,120 --> 00:32:01,640
Speaker 1: our mail on it? And they said sure for a

575
00:32:01,680 --> 00:32:05,480
Speaker 1: few billion dollars a year. And the Postal Service said great.

576
00:32:05,600 --> 00:32:09,560
Speaker 1: But at the same time they kind of, um, they

577
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:12,960
Speaker 1: stepped forward into the twenty first century by doing so.

578
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:19,040
Speaker 1: And the Postal Service, having access to everyone's mailbox, is

579
00:32:19,080 --> 00:32:22,040
Speaker 1: often tapped by UPS and FedEx deliver what's called in

580
00:32:22,040 --> 00:32:25,520
Speaker 1: the business the last mile. Yeah. So a lot of times,

581
00:32:25,800 --> 00:32:28,600
Speaker 1: especially if you're a rural person, if you get something

582
00:32:28,640 --> 00:32:31,840
Speaker 1: from Amazon, it's it was shipped by UPS, but eventually

583
00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:34,600
Speaker 1: it made its way into your postal carriers route and

584
00:32:34,960 --> 00:32:37,600
Speaker 1: being delivered by the Postal Service. Yeah, there's way more

585
00:32:37,800 --> 00:32:42,120
Speaker 1: mixing of package mailing than you would think. Um, it's

586
00:32:42,120 --> 00:32:44,960
Speaker 1: like a swinger party or something pretty much. Uh. And

587
00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:48,160
Speaker 1: part of that deal in two thousand one with FedEx was, Hey,

588
00:32:48,280 --> 00:32:52,480
Speaker 1: FedEx said, can we put our boxes at your post offices?

589
00:32:53,040 --> 00:32:57,160
Speaker 1: And they said sure for six million dollars And they said,

590
00:32:57,760 --> 00:32:59,320
Speaker 1: you know, can we hit your ride on your plane.

591
00:32:59,400 --> 00:33:02,640
Speaker 1: They said, sure, for six point three billions over seven years.

592
00:33:03,160 --> 00:33:05,160
Speaker 1: But it's you know, seems like a good agreement. And

593
00:33:05,200 --> 00:33:09,120
Speaker 1: they did the same with ups and uh we scratch

594
00:33:09,160 --> 00:33:12,760
Speaker 1: our back, you scratch yours, we scratch your back, we'll

595
00:33:12,760 --> 00:33:17,280
Speaker 1: scratch yours. That works. Yeah, why didn't everybody scratch them back?

596
00:33:17,360 --> 00:33:20,560
Speaker 1: I don't know. Okay, um, because it's hard to reach.

597
00:33:21,600 --> 00:33:24,840
Speaker 1: Uh So, if you realize that the postal service needs

598
00:33:24,840 --> 00:33:27,320
Speaker 1: a few billion extra dollars, you say, why are you

599
00:33:27,320 --> 00:33:31,200
Speaker 1: just up the postal rates? Yeah, well, the federal government

600
00:33:31,280 --> 00:33:33,160
Speaker 1: keeps its thumb on that they want to make sure

601
00:33:33,200 --> 00:33:37,680
Speaker 1: that anybody who needs to mail a letter can do

602
00:33:37,720 --> 00:33:40,680
Speaker 1: so without great expense. Yeah, it's a big deal to

603
00:33:40,760 --> 00:33:42,920
Speaker 1: change the postal rate. Like it is, much more than

604
00:33:42,920 --> 00:33:44,480
Speaker 1: you would think, because a layman like me would just

605
00:33:44,520 --> 00:33:46,280
Speaker 1: be like, yeah, I just add a few cents. Who cares. Yeah,

606
00:33:46,320 --> 00:33:49,400
Speaker 1: it's the problem just printing those forever stance genius idea.

607
00:33:49,440 --> 00:33:51,080
Speaker 1: You don't have to go back and reprint a bunch

608
00:33:51,120 --> 00:33:54,920
Speaker 1: with the amount great idea or the one cent. Remember

609
00:33:54,960 --> 00:33:57,520
Speaker 1: in Fargo, Yeah, when the Wade got the one center

610
00:33:57,800 --> 00:33:59,920
Speaker 1: with the ducks. Yeah, and she was like everyone needs

611
00:33:59,920 --> 00:34:02,800
Speaker 1: the once sent whenever they raise the rates. Yeah, he's like, cool, Gee,

612
00:34:02,800 --> 00:34:06,160
Speaker 1: I didn't think about that. Um so, but yes, there's

613
00:34:06,160 --> 00:34:10,399
Speaker 1: a very long, protracted, difficult process of raising the postal rates.

614
00:34:10,440 --> 00:34:13,120
Speaker 1: It's not a very easy thing and it involves a

615
00:34:13,160 --> 00:34:16,200
Speaker 1: ton of bureaucracy. Should we get into that or just

616
00:34:16,400 --> 00:34:18,600
Speaker 1: leave it at that? It's up to you, man, I

617
00:34:18,600 --> 00:34:20,640
Speaker 1: think we should just leave it at that. Okay. So

618
00:34:20,800 --> 00:34:23,560
Speaker 1: if you are going to mail something from your house,

619
00:34:23,600 --> 00:34:27,200
Speaker 1: you need your little mailbox, and I just installed mine

620
00:34:27,360 --> 00:34:29,800
Speaker 1: in what seemed like a sensible manner. I didn't realize

621
00:34:29,840 --> 00:34:33,120
Speaker 1: that there were actual rules. Um. In fact, you were

622
00:34:33,120 --> 00:34:37,120
Speaker 1: supposed to contact the post office before installing your mailbox,

623
00:34:37,120 --> 00:34:39,719
Speaker 1: which I had no idea. UM, to make sure it's

624
00:34:39,760 --> 00:34:43,239
Speaker 1: like the correct placement and height and so like the

625
00:34:43,680 --> 00:34:46,040
Speaker 1: post office person or the mail career, I don't have

626
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:48,399
Speaker 1: to get out of the truck. Oh well they'll they'll

627
00:34:48,480 --> 00:34:52,200
Speaker 1: burn it down if it's not the specification. So you

628
00:34:52,239 --> 00:34:54,360
Speaker 1: want to contact the post office? I didn't, but I

629
00:34:54,360 --> 00:34:57,000
Speaker 1: guess I just lucked out because, um they say generally

630
00:34:58,080 --> 00:35:01,400
Speaker 1: in from the road surface to the inside floor of

631
00:35:01,440 --> 00:35:04,479
Speaker 1: the mailbox or point of entry, and then set back

632
00:35:04,480 --> 00:35:06,319
Speaker 1: six to eight inches from the front face of the

633
00:35:06,360 --> 00:35:09,760
Speaker 1: curb or road edge to the mailbox door. I guess

634
00:35:09,760 --> 00:35:12,600
Speaker 1: I just got lucky then, because I get my mail,

635
00:35:13,840 --> 00:35:16,880
Speaker 1: you know, without any burning down over here now or

636
00:35:16,960 --> 00:35:19,480
Speaker 1: without a post office spots box, which we talked about.

637
00:35:19,600 --> 00:35:21,680
Speaker 1: They've been around for a couple of hundred years. And

638
00:35:21,719 --> 00:35:24,239
Speaker 1: that's if you want to have a little key to

639
00:35:24,280 --> 00:35:26,239
Speaker 1: your little loan box in a post office and get

640
00:35:26,280 --> 00:35:29,360
Speaker 1: your mail there, you can certainly do that. It's handy

641
00:35:29,520 --> 00:35:31,200
Speaker 1: if you're starting out of business and you want to

642
00:35:31,200 --> 00:35:34,960
Speaker 1: make people think that you're not working out of your house. Um,

643
00:35:35,040 --> 00:35:36,759
Speaker 1: you can get a post office and say, look, I

644
00:35:36,800 --> 00:35:41,080
Speaker 1: have a PO box, which means I'm working out of

645
00:35:41,120 --> 00:35:44,200
Speaker 1: my bedroom. It's like code, I think, are you getting

646
00:35:44,200 --> 00:35:47,040
Speaker 1: guns in the mail? Is that what people do? I'm

647
00:35:47,040 --> 00:35:48,680
Speaker 1: sure there's a lot of people who try to get

648
00:35:48,680 --> 00:35:52,160
Speaker 1: guns in the mail in the p O boxes. Yeah sure, okay.

649
00:35:52,400 --> 00:35:55,160
Speaker 1: Or if you um tend to move around a lot

650
00:35:55,200 --> 00:35:57,839
Speaker 1: in the same town and you don't want to worry

651
00:35:57,840 --> 00:36:00,680
Speaker 1: about changing your mail and forwarding mail, you could always

652
00:36:00,680 --> 00:36:03,719
Speaker 1: just get a PO box. Yeah. So those are some reasons. Um,

653
00:36:03,920 --> 00:36:05,760
Speaker 1: you want to talk the future of the post office

654
00:36:06,120 --> 00:36:09,400
Speaker 1: if it's around after October two. What is the future

655
00:36:09,440 --> 00:36:11,480
Speaker 1: of the post Office. Well, there's a lot of stuff

656
00:36:11,520 --> 00:36:15,520
Speaker 1: coming down the pike. Um, there's the cancelation of Saturday

657
00:36:15,520 --> 00:36:19,719
Speaker 1: mail this August. They're really going hard after package delivery services.

658
00:36:19,760 --> 00:36:22,120
Speaker 1: Now what trying to oh with like the flat rates

659
00:36:22,120 --> 00:36:25,239
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. Just really like courting businesses to say, hey,

660
00:36:25,400 --> 00:36:30,080
Speaker 1: consider us instead of ups or FedEx um and uh,

661
00:36:30,280 --> 00:36:35,040
Speaker 1: especially with prescription medicines because we have an aging population

662
00:36:35,120 --> 00:36:37,640
Speaker 1: is going to do nothing but increase in size, so

663
00:36:37,680 --> 00:36:40,000
Speaker 1: you're gonna need more prescriptions through the mail. So hey,

664
00:36:40,080 --> 00:36:42,080
Speaker 1: let's get into that. Yeah, and you can get stuff

665
00:36:42,120 --> 00:36:46,800
Speaker 1: like that certified and insured and uh, signature delivery approved

666
00:36:46,800 --> 00:36:48,919
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. It's helpful. Part of the post

667
00:36:48,960 --> 00:36:52,680
Speaker 1: office is pledged that your letter carrier won't take your

668
00:36:52,800 --> 00:36:57,960
Speaker 1: medication before delivering it might hit you up for something, right. Um.

669
00:36:58,000 --> 00:37:01,080
Speaker 1: But there's also a line of clothing coming out postal service.

670
00:37:01,120 --> 00:37:04,560
Speaker 1: Line of clothing coming out, I'm not kidding, called rain,

671
00:37:04,600 --> 00:37:08,319
Speaker 1: heat or snow. And as we almost didn't mention this,

672
00:37:08,920 --> 00:37:13,360
Speaker 1: so the Postal Services creed right, neither rain nor snow,

673
00:37:13,520 --> 00:37:17,200
Speaker 1: nor sleep, sleep nor holland rain or sleep nor snow,

674
00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:21,279
Speaker 1: nor neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of

675
00:37:21,400 --> 00:37:24,319
Speaker 1: night stays these carriers from the swift completion of their

676
00:37:24,520 --> 00:37:28,680
Speaker 1: appointed rounds. And that's actually not the post Office's official model.

677
00:37:28,719 --> 00:37:31,160
Speaker 1: They don't have one, but it's been linked to them.

678
00:37:31,200 --> 00:37:34,680
Speaker 1: And it's actually an adaptation of something from Herodotus, the

679
00:37:34,840 --> 00:37:39,520
Speaker 1: Greek historian, who was making a comment about how the Persians,

680
00:37:39,640 --> 00:37:43,759
Speaker 1: even during their war and like five b c. They

681
00:37:43,800 --> 00:37:46,359
Speaker 1: were one of the first ones to establish a real

682
00:37:46,400 --> 00:37:50,360
Speaker 1: postal service, and even during war, the postal service didn't stop.

683
00:37:50,719 --> 00:37:55,320
Speaker 1: They were still documents being delivered, and Herodotus was commenting

684
00:37:55,360 --> 00:37:57,319
Speaker 1: on that, and that's where that came from. It should

685
00:37:57,360 --> 00:37:59,960
Speaker 1: include like or loss of limb. It did originally, Like

686
00:38:00,080 --> 00:38:02,200
Speaker 1: that's an adaptation. It wasn't loss of limb, but it

687
00:38:02,239 --> 00:38:06,040
Speaker 1: was something like some sort of sicknesses befalling you. They

688
00:38:06,040 --> 00:38:09,759
Speaker 1: were putting the mail before themselves. The show must go on, right. Um.

689
00:38:09,840 --> 00:38:12,239
Speaker 1: So there's a line of clothing called the rain or

690
00:38:12,280 --> 00:38:15,560
Speaker 1: heat or snow um and then um. They're also talking

691
00:38:15,600 --> 00:38:19,960
Speaker 1: about creating federal email addresses that you get at birth.

692
00:38:20,680 --> 00:38:23,200
Speaker 1: Just like you have a physical address, you would also

693
00:38:23,280 --> 00:38:25,640
Speaker 1: have an email address, but your email address is attached

694
00:38:25,680 --> 00:38:28,160
Speaker 1: to you rather than the physical location you live at.

695
00:38:28,920 --> 00:38:31,400
Speaker 1: And if you say need to correspond with the I

696
00:38:31,520 --> 00:38:35,120
Speaker 1: R S Or Social Security Administration something like that, you

697
00:38:35,160 --> 00:38:39,720
Speaker 1: would send like this very secure email through this Postal

698
00:38:39,760 --> 00:38:42,880
Speaker 1: Services portal. Everything else you could just use like you know,

699
00:38:43,000 --> 00:38:46,560
Speaker 1: Gmail or Yahoo or whatever for everyday stuff. But this

700
00:38:46,640 --> 00:38:49,120
Speaker 1: is like the big stuff, the really important stuff. And

701
00:38:49,120 --> 00:38:51,680
Speaker 1: then the postal service would also offer like a digital

702
00:38:51,760 --> 00:38:56,360
Speaker 1: lock box for um, the like like a will or

703
00:38:56,440 --> 00:39:00,239
Speaker 1: your medical records or something like that. Yeah, and listen,

704
00:39:00,360 --> 00:39:05,200
Speaker 1: is every conspiracy uh person in the country now says

705
00:39:05,560 --> 00:39:08,880
Speaker 1: in a way, I want a federal email attached to

706
00:39:08,920 --> 00:39:11,799
Speaker 1: my name that I have to send things through. Yeah,

707
00:39:11,840 --> 00:39:14,319
Speaker 1: well that's the number of the Beast. Obviously, I don't

708
00:39:14,360 --> 00:39:15,560
Speaker 1: know that I would want that either. And I'm not

709
00:39:15,600 --> 00:39:18,120
Speaker 1: a big conspiracy guy. Oh, it's not that you have

710
00:39:18,200 --> 00:39:19,919
Speaker 1: to send it through that. It's that if you send

711
00:39:19,960 --> 00:39:22,839
Speaker 1: it through that, if somebody hijacks that er reads it,

712
00:39:22,920 --> 00:39:25,280
Speaker 1: you're going to be in a lot more trouble federally

713
00:39:25,280 --> 00:39:27,760
Speaker 1: speaking than they would be if like they read your Gmail.

714
00:39:28,160 --> 00:39:30,800
Speaker 1: Because didn't it illegal to to open like a federal

715
00:39:30,840 --> 00:39:33,439
Speaker 1: offense to get someone's exactly? And that's what this there's

716
00:39:33,440 --> 00:39:35,120
Speaker 1: this guy who runs a think tank for the Postal

717
00:39:35,160 --> 00:39:38,880
Speaker 1: Service who's who's like, it's not just about mailing documents,

718
00:39:38,920 --> 00:39:44,840
Speaker 1: it's about protecting the connectedness of the United States and Americans,

719
00:39:44,880 --> 00:39:46,719
Speaker 1: So how do we do that in a digital world?

720
00:39:46,800 --> 00:39:49,600
Speaker 1: He's thinking about this. So if you're even the least

721
00:39:49,640 --> 00:39:53,680
Speaker 1: bit interested by this episode that we just recorded, Um,

722
00:39:53,800 --> 00:40:01,920
Speaker 1: there's an Esquire article called too I did, there's ae do.

723
00:40:02,200 --> 00:40:04,160
Speaker 1: It's called do We Really Want to Live Without the

724
00:40:04,200 --> 00:40:07,920
Speaker 1: Post Office? And it's by Jesse Lichtenstein, And um, it

725
00:40:08,080 --> 00:40:11,040
Speaker 1: is really good, man. It's a really good overview of

726
00:40:11,320 --> 00:40:14,520
Speaker 1: what does Jesse think, Uh, we need he or she

727
00:40:14,800 --> 00:40:16,960
Speaker 1: I think kind of leans toward we need it. And

728
00:40:17,000 --> 00:40:19,239
Speaker 1: the more you start to read about it, the more

729
00:40:19,320 --> 00:40:23,800
Speaker 1: this weird kind of civic affection for the post office developed.

730
00:40:23,880 --> 00:40:26,440
Speaker 1: And you know where I'm like, yeah, we don't want

731
00:40:26,440 --> 00:40:28,279
Speaker 1: to get rid of the post office. You want the

732
00:40:28,320 --> 00:40:31,319
Speaker 1: post office? Who doesn't want the post office? It's kind

733
00:40:31,320 --> 00:40:34,319
Speaker 1: of it kind of develops. Yeah, I used to like,

734
00:40:34,400 --> 00:40:36,600
Speaker 1: you know, maybe it was a simpler day, or maybe

735
00:40:36,600 --> 00:40:39,520
Speaker 1: the people stuck with their routes longer, But I remember

736
00:40:39,560 --> 00:40:42,960
Speaker 1: my postman growing up. It was the same guy for years,

737
00:40:43,400 --> 00:40:45,080
Speaker 1: and we lived on We didn't live in a neighborhood.

738
00:40:45,080 --> 00:40:47,040
Speaker 1: We lived on a street in the woods with like

739
00:40:47,080 --> 00:40:49,440
Speaker 1: six houses, and so you know, I would run out

740
00:40:49,480 --> 00:40:51,480
Speaker 1: and check the mail and wave at them, and we

741
00:40:51,480 --> 00:40:54,040
Speaker 1: would give him like gifts at Christmas and that's awesome.

742
00:40:54,080 --> 00:40:56,320
Speaker 1: And now I have no idea who my postal curious?

743
00:40:56,320 --> 00:40:58,319
Speaker 1: Which is my fault? I need to just go out there,

744
00:40:58,560 --> 00:41:01,640
Speaker 1: I think you do. Yeah. And also the postal services

745
00:41:01,719 --> 00:41:05,880
Speaker 1: responsible for the largest food drive in the United States

746
00:41:05,960 --> 00:41:08,400
Speaker 1: every year. Yeah, you know that food drive where you

747
00:41:08,400 --> 00:41:10,759
Speaker 1: like you just put like canned food in your in

748
00:41:10,800 --> 00:41:15,040
Speaker 1: your mailbox, in your postal you can do that. Yeah,

749
00:41:15,120 --> 00:41:17,680
Speaker 1: I've never heard of. It hasn't been very well publicized,

750
00:41:17,719 --> 00:41:21,400
Speaker 1: but it's like at least around here, I guess. But um,

751
00:41:21,400 --> 00:41:23,759
Speaker 1: it's a huge food drive or at the very least,

752
00:41:23,800 --> 00:41:27,200
Speaker 1: postal carriers are taking and eating cans of viol for

753
00:41:27,280 --> 00:41:30,040
Speaker 1: dinner like this is delicious. I love this food drive. Yes,

754
00:41:30,120 --> 00:41:31,720
Speaker 1: I don't just put cans of food in your mailbox.

755
00:41:31,800 --> 00:41:34,000
Speaker 1: Check in too when that is supposed to That's got

756
00:41:34,000 --> 00:41:35,960
Speaker 1: to be the worst day of the year for letter carrier,

757
00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:40,399
Speaker 1: my gosh. Yeah, can you imagine it's a lot of weight. Yeah, Um,

758
00:41:40,600 --> 00:41:44,880
Speaker 1: you got anything else? No respect your post postal carrier?

759
00:41:45,040 --> 00:41:47,120
Speaker 1: You want everybody go out and meet their postal carry? Yeah,

760
00:41:47,120 --> 00:41:48,719
Speaker 1: why not give him a hug? Actually, don't do that,

761
00:41:48,760 --> 00:41:52,040
Speaker 1: they might make you or something. Yeah, but give him

762
00:41:52,080 --> 00:41:54,879
Speaker 1: a wave. Um. If you want to learn more about

763
00:41:55,040 --> 00:41:58,400
Speaker 1: the post office, you can type that word those words

764
00:41:58,400 --> 00:42:00,560
Speaker 1: into the search bar house to works dot com and

765
00:42:00,719 --> 00:42:02,719
Speaker 1: uh be sure to check out the Esquire article too.

766
00:42:02,719 --> 00:42:05,880
Speaker 1: It's very cool. Um and uh, I guess before we

767
00:42:05,880 --> 00:42:07,880
Speaker 1: get into that, chuck, you want a message from our sponsor,

768
00:42:08,239 --> 00:42:41,640
Speaker 1: let's do that. Yeah, Uh okay, now it's listener mel Josh,

769
00:42:41,640 --> 00:42:45,960
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call this uh um fan who thought we

770
00:42:45,960 --> 00:42:48,040
Speaker 1: were wrong and did a little research and we may

771
00:42:48,080 --> 00:42:51,200
Speaker 1: not be wrong after call. Oh, yeah, that's a nice.

772
00:42:51,680 --> 00:42:53,600
Speaker 1: We had a bunch of filmmakers right in when we

773
00:42:53,680 --> 00:43:01,000
Speaker 1: talked about the um subliminal messages being inserted into movies

774
00:43:01,680 --> 00:43:06,359
Speaker 1: in the nineteen fifties by James Vickery, because we said

775
00:43:06,480 --> 00:43:09,719
Speaker 1: it's one three thousand of a second or something, and

776
00:43:09,760 --> 00:43:12,000
Speaker 1: a bunch of filmmakers went, there's only twenty four frames

777
00:43:12,040 --> 00:43:14,160
Speaker 1: per second, so if you switched out one frame, it

778
00:43:14,200 --> 00:43:17,080
Speaker 1: would only be there's no way, there's no way. And

779
00:43:17,080 --> 00:43:18,880
Speaker 1: where'd you get this number? Where'd you get this number?

780
00:43:19,200 --> 00:43:21,160
Speaker 1: I went back and looked, and I was like, I mean,

781
00:43:21,200 --> 00:43:25,120
Speaker 1: I see this number in various places. But um so,

782
00:43:25,160 --> 00:43:28,359
Speaker 1: we got this email from Brian Henry that disputed this,

783
00:43:28,920 --> 00:43:32,000
Speaker 1: and then he wrote back with this, Hey, guys, looks

784
00:43:32,000 --> 00:43:34,040
Speaker 1: like a may I have've spoken too soon. I was

785
00:43:34,080 --> 00:43:37,399
Speaker 1: assuming that Vickery was just changing the film itself, which

786
00:43:37,400 --> 00:43:40,560
Speaker 1: were dissolved in the messages showing much slower in at

787
00:43:40,560 --> 00:43:44,320
Speaker 1: the maximum the second. But I did some research and

788
00:43:44,360 --> 00:43:48,600
Speaker 1: apparently he used something called a uh I've never heard

789
00:43:48,640 --> 00:43:55,320
Speaker 1: this before, a tachi stato scope tacha stop to to

790
00:43:55,520 --> 00:43:57,960
Speaker 1: just the scope. I think you got it to just

791
00:43:58,120 --> 00:44:01,560
Speaker 1: the scope okay, to project the messages on the screen,

792
00:44:01,760 --> 00:44:04,200
Speaker 1: not the movie projector. He said, so this way he

793
00:44:04,200 --> 00:44:06,520
Speaker 1: would have had a lot more control over the speed

794
00:44:06,560 --> 00:44:10,200
Speaker 1: of the messages. And um So, to all the filmmakers

795
00:44:10,239 --> 00:44:12,319
Speaker 1: out there who wrote in and challenged us boom, I

796
00:44:12,360 --> 00:44:13,800
Speaker 1: wrote back to a few that was like, jeez, I

797
00:44:13,840 --> 00:44:15,879
Speaker 1: don't know, man, I'm like, I'm looking for it. Then

798
00:44:15,880 --> 00:44:17,880
Speaker 1: they you know someone we're even kind of snotty about,

799
00:44:17,960 --> 00:44:21,920
Speaker 1: like the should research the more so, apparently put that

800
00:44:21,960 --> 00:44:24,840
Speaker 1: in your tits, gope and smoke it. That's what I say.

801
00:44:25,080 --> 00:44:29,200
Speaker 1: And that is from Brian Henry. Yeah. Thanks for the

802
00:44:29,239 --> 00:44:31,760
Speaker 1: research you know, and being a good guy saying hey,

803
00:44:31,800 --> 00:44:35,040
Speaker 1: I was wrong because you were wrong. He was. He

804
00:44:35,080 --> 00:44:38,000
Speaker 1: was one of the nicer ones about it. Well, thank you. Yeah. Um,

805
00:44:38,040 --> 00:44:40,880
Speaker 1: if you want to let us know that you were wrong,

806
00:44:41,080 --> 00:44:44,279
Speaker 1: even though you had told us that we were wrong

807
00:44:44,320 --> 00:44:48,000
Speaker 1: at first, we love those um you can tweet that

808
00:44:48,080 --> 00:44:50,200
Speaker 1: to us at s y s K podcast. You can

809
00:44:50,280 --> 00:44:52,640
Speaker 1: join us on Facebook dot com slash Stuff you Should Know,

810
00:44:53,200 --> 00:44:55,719
Speaker 1: or you can send us an email to stuff podcast

811
00:44:55,760 --> 00:45:01,239
Speaker 1: at how stuff Works dot com. Stuff you Should Know

812
00:45:01,280 --> 00:45:03,719
Speaker 1: is a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works. For

813
00:45:03,800 --> 00:45:06,439
Speaker 1: more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,

814
00:45:06,520 --> 00:45:09,160
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

815
00:45:09,719 --> 00:45:09,759
Speaker 1: M