The announcement that 110 workers at Chattanooga’s Shallowford Road Mail Processing and Distribution Center will be transferred or laid off sometime after mid-May highlights the painful but inescapable fact that the Postal Service has grown less useful to many Americans.
The closing of the Chattanooga facility is one of hundreds announced Thursday. Nationwide, closings and consolidations will mean the loss of about 35,000 jobs, postal officials said, though many are expected to come through attrition, not layoffs.
No one delights in job losses, but the Postal Service cannot keep operating at current staffing levels when demand for its services has plunged.
How grave is the agency’s financial condition? On its current trajectory, it expects to be losing up to $18.2 billion per year by 2015.
Much of that is due to the fact that millions of Americans every year are turning to the Internet for bill paying and routine correspondence. It’s fast and doesn’t require the cumbersome use of stamps and envelopes.