Bob's Backyard

Have you ever shipped a package?  Received one?  What carrier did you use?

I prefer UPS.  They are efficient, have a great tracking system so I always know where my package is, and never once have they claimed to have delivered a package when in fact it was sitting in limbo somewhere.

I bet you’ve used UPS hundreds if not thousands of times yourself.  Or FedEx.  But why?  Why would you even need UPS or FedEx when the US Postal service exists?

The Postal Service is the second largest employer in the country, after WalMart (and not including the federal government).  The Postal Service is an “independence agency of the United States government”.

Yet you use UPS and FedEx, likely because they are cheaper, faster, and more reliable at delivering parcels.  Huh.  Interesting.

Where I live we have a “municipal utility”.  It provides electricity, cable TV, broadband Internet, and telephone service.  Our electric rates are pretty darn close to the same as Aliant Energy is charging in this state.  Maybe even higher.  REC, who provides service just blocks from my home charges about half of what our municipal electric service charges.  But I’m stuck with the “public” option, which costs more.

I don’t use the cable tv.  I use Dish Network.  Why?  More choices.  I get about twice as many channels on Dish, and about five times more HD channels.  We also have Mediacom in our area providing cable, Internet, and phone.  The cable tv service is priced within a dollar of the city offering.

For Internet I use Qwest.  It’s actually $10 a month cheaper, for speeds that are about double of the municipal offering.  Mediacom is faster than either one, and costs about the same as the municipal.

I also use Qwest for my local telephone service.  It costs $24.95 per month for local service, including Caller ID, Call Waiting, and Call Forwarding.  Now here it gets interesting.  The municipal service is $12.95.  It includes those same three custom services.  But if I want to keep the phone number that I’ve had since 1997 I have to add $2.95 a month.  And then I lose the $5 a month discount that Qwest is giving me for my DSL service, effectively raising the price of the municipal offering to $20.90.  I could save $4.00.  But wait, there’s more.

If I switch from Qwest to the municipal telephone service there are some gotchas.  Qwest works all the time.  The municipal won’t work during a power failure.  I can add a battery backup, but if the equipment out on the pole runs out of battery power, I’m still left with no service.  How would I dial 911?  More importantly, how would my kids dial 911?

What the hell is my point?  I’ve actually got three points.

1. Private carriers often perform better than the US Postal Service.
2. “Public” utilities are not necessarily cheaper than private investor owned utilities
3. “Public” utilities often perform worse, and offer less choice than private utilities.

Now, which one do you want managing your health care?