The idea for a recent illustration I did in support of the United States Postal Service (USPS), came to me while reading through “The Design of Dissent” by Milton Glaser, Mirko Ilic, and Steven Heller. Established on July 26, 1775, the Post Office is mentioned in Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution. Much like everyone right now, the USPS is not immune to the financial toles taken during this current pandemic. The drop of mail volume is projected to drop by at least 50% as the pandemic wears on.
The topic of mail-in ballots being the possible cornerstone of the upcoming 2020 elections has further politicised this service and the GOP has long wanted to privatize the USPS to treat it more like a business.
Not all hope is lost and this isn’t the first time we’ve seen the post office financially struggle since its inception. There are things that you can do in order to help support the USPS that are very simple:
- The primary revenue for the USPS comes through first-class mail. The current covid-19 pandemic has affected the volume of business mail coming through the post office. A handwritten letter or postcard has more impact at times. Buy stamps or join letter writing programs.
- Reach out to your representatives in Congress and ask them to support the USPS through these times.
I just recently found out there are this like resist.bot, that allow you to easily send emails to your representatives (via an SMS service). You can text USPS to 50409. Once you text them, they will send you a series of questions so they can fill out the required fields on your representatives’ websites.
Further Reading
The Design of Dissent by Milton Glaser and Mirko Ilic – https://amzn.to/30mvO8E
