GGD-96-129B Postal Service Reform
United States General Accounting Office Report to the Ranking Minority Member, GAO Subcommittee on Post Office and Civil Service, Committee on Governmental Affairs, U.S. Senate September 1996 POSTAL SERVICE REFORM Issues Relevant To Changing Restrictions on Private Letter Delivery GOA years 1921 - 1996 GAO/GGD-96-129B Volume II Preface This volume of GAO’s report presents a detailed analysis of the restrictions in federal, civil, and criminal law on private letter delivery, the Private Express Statutes. Volume I summarizes the results of GAO’s review, including issues relevant to potential Postal Service reform and any future changes to the Statutes. In chapter 1, GAO provides background information on the Postal Service’s public service mission, the history and current provisions of the Statutes, and the recent congressional interest in reforming the Postal Service. Included are the objectives, scope, and methodology of GAO’s review for this report. GAO focused primarily on the period from the Postal Reorganization Act of 1970 through 1995. The four chapters that follow cover various aspects of restrictions on private letter delivery. These are • the basis for the restrictions in law, economic theory, and current Postal Service policy and some of the Service’s experiences in administering and enforcing the Statutes since 1970 (ch. 2); • the growth and development of private message and package delivery capacity since 1970 (ch. 3); • the risk of possible mail volume losses and estimates of the potential effects of such losses on the Service’s revenue, costs, and rates (ch. 4); and • the postal reform efforts of selected other countries, including changes to restrictions on private letter delivery (ch.
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