18 Not So Obvious Ways the Post Office Helps Americans

The United States is a nation of more than 330 million people, and the USPS delivers mail to more than 163 million addresses in this country, so keeping those addresses up to date is a huge task. The USPS processed 36 million address changes in 2021, more than 20 million of them submitted online.

Every two weeks, the Postal Service pays its employees $2.15 billion in salaries and benefits.

The Postal Service is pushing ahead in optical character-recognition technology, with machines reading nearly 98% of all hand-addressed letters and 99.5% of machine-printed mail.

The U.S. Postal Inspection Service enforces federal laws and thwarts crimes to keep customers, employees, and the mail safe. The Inspection Service has about 2,400 employees, including nearly 1,300 postal inspectors, roughly 500 uniformed postal police officers, and 600 professional, technical, and administrative support personnel. Postal inspectors responded to and investigated 2,010 suspicious mail incidents in 2021.

Part of the USPS’ responsibilities is interdicting illicit drug packages. The Postal Service uses data, forensics, and tips from citizens to combat drug distribution. In the fiscal years 2017 to 2021, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service made 2,113 seizures of synthetic opioids – including 790 seizures (985 pounds’s worth) in fiscal 2021 alone.