The Department of Government Efficiency is teaming up with the U.S. Postal Service, and it’s a good thing. Last week, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy told Congress he had reached an agreement with the DOGE to root out inefficiencies and help the service address “big problems” — most of which are financial. As an initial cost-cutting gesture, the USPS is reducing its workforce by 10,000 through a voluntary early retirement program.
The DOGE certainly has its work cut out for it. The USPS lost an astounding $9.5 billion in fiscal year 2024 and is projected to lose an additional $60 billion to $70 billion by 2030. However, most of this spending is wasteful — not essential — which positions the service, through proper reforms, to recover and once again deliver for taxpayers and consumers.
Small cuts, combined with more significant reforms, add up. It’s time for the DOGE to start trimming the fat.
One place to start is the service’s electric vehicle purchases. The USPS is eager to replace most of its aging fleet of more than 200,000 mail trucks, which, according to the latest iteration of a 2021 deal with supplier Oshkosh Corp., will cost nearly $10 billion for a fleet of roughly 100,000 vehicles, including 66,000 EVs.
Going back to gas
This agreement is a financial disaster. EV deliveries are already behind schedule, and according to DeJoy, taxpayers and consumers are paying anywhere from $10,000 to $20,000 more per EV than for their gas-powered counterparts — and even that may be an underestimate.
In 2022, Congress appropriated for the USPS $3 billion in taxpayer dollars for EV purchases, including $1.29 billion for vehicles and $1.71 billion for charging infrastructure.
When factoring in this one-time subsidy and the Postal Service’s own investment, switching to an all-gas fleet could save nearly $1 billion annually over the next decade. Fortunately, Oshkosh appears open to renegotiating the contract.
If Oshkosh doesn’t play ball, however, lawmakers may step in. Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) and Rep. Michael Cloud (R-Texas) have introduced the “Return to Sender Act” to recoup taxpayer money wasted on these EV purchases.
Ending Saturday mail deliveries is another straightforward way to cut costs. The USPS currently delivers mail Monday through Saturday, with some packages delivered on Sundays. Shifting to a five-day delivery schedule could reduce costs and improve worker morale. The USPS itself proposed this change in its 2013 “Five-Year Business Plan,” estimating savings of $1.9 billion per year — roughly $2.6 billion today after adjusting for inflation — amounting to about one-third of the service’s average annual losses in recent years.
USPS makes … television?
Beyond these major cuts, the USPS continues to waste money in baffling ways.
The service has ventured into television production, premiering a show called “Dear Santa, The Series” in 2022. This isn’t even its first attempt at TV. The USPS also produced “The Inspectors,” a show that struggled with mediocre ratings. While the costs of these productions remain unclear, the Taxpayers Protection Alliance Foundation plans to file Freedom of Information Act requests to uncover the figures.
TPAF will also investigate the USPS’ suspicious — and increasingly bleeding — check-cashing and money-order operations in addition to the agency’s public relations spending on gratuitous programs like its thin-skinned responses to op-eds and an official podcast.
Small cuts, combined with more significant reforms, add up. In all, the USPS can save more than $7 billion per year with a few common-sense spending cuts. It’s time for the DOGE to start trimming the fat.
Doge, Postal service, Spending cuts, Electric vehicles, Mail, Louis dejoy, Congress, Opinion & analysis
