Postal and Delivery Services

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xv

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2. Liberalization and the Universal Service Obligation

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 1-1

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   2. Putty-Putty, Putty-Clay or Humpty-Dumpty?

      • Michael A. Crew, Paul R. Kleindorfer

      Pages 3-29

   3. Funding the Universal Service Obligation under Liberalisation

      • Philippe De Donder, Helmuth Cremer, Frank Rodriguez

      Pages 31-52

   4. Assessing Liberalization in Context

      • Michael Bradley, Jeff Colvin, Mary Perkins

      Pages 53-73

   5. Sustainability of USO in a Liberalized Postal Market

      • Anna Lundgren

      Pages 75-86

   6. A Comparison of the Burden of Universal Service in Italy and the United States

      • Robert Cohen, Carla Pace, Matthew Robinson, Gennaro Scarfiglieri, Rossana Scocchera, Vincenzo Visco Comandini et al.

      Pages 87-106

   7. The Welfare Economics of Universal Service Standards and Service Quality

      • Ian Reay

      Pages 107-126

   8. Two-Tier Pricing under Liberalization

      • Michael A. Crew, Paul R. Kleindorfer

      Pages 127-142

3. Cost and Demand Studies

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 143-143

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   2. Postal Services Cost Modeling

      • José Soares, João Confraria, Alberto Pimenta

      Pages 145-160

   3. An Econometric Study of Cost Elasticity in the Activities of Post Office Counters

      • Catherine Cazals, Pascale Duchemin, Jean-Pierre Florens, Bernard Roy, Olivier Vialaneix

      Pages 161-170

   4. Mail Demand in the Long and Short Term

      • Jean-Pierre Florens, Sarah Marcy, Joëlle Toledano

      Pages 171-190

   5. Productivity and the Substitution between Labor and Capital in Postal Organizations

      • Heikki Nikali

      Pages 191-201

   6. Disaggregated Letter Traffic Demand in the UK

      • John Nankervis, Sophie Richard, Soterios Soteri, Frank Rodriguez

      Pages 203-218

4. Strategic Issues

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 219-219

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   2. People and Privatization

      • Mary S. Elcano, Robert A. F. Reisner, R. Andrew German, Margaret P. Crenshaw

      Pages 221-245

   3. Modern Postal Reform Laws

      • James I. Campbell Jr.

      Pages 247-269

   4. Evaluation of a Public Post Office

      • Dale Clark, Geoff Bickerton

      Pages 271-297

   5. Saturday Delivery: Who Provides It? Who Needs It?

      • John Haldi, John T. Schmidt

      Pages 299-315

When Postmaster General Creswell penned his concern about the impact 2 of electronic diversion on his postal organization, the year was 1872. General Creswell, it turned out, fretted unnecessarily. Facsimile did not achieve commercial viability until roughly a century after his tenure as Postmaster General and today that technology is fading rapidly from the communication scene. Moreover, it never appears to have significantly affected physical letter volumes. However, if General Creswell were leading a major postal organization today, he likely would feel threatened by the potential of Internet communication to cause electronic diversion of physical mail. Should recent technology developments cause the oft-predicted (but so far incorrect) inflection point that would mark the beginning of declining mail volumes. the implications from a management standpoint will be profound. The relatively fixed nature of postal costs suggest that volume declines must be offset though improved productivity, reduced cost of inputs, revenue from new products that share common costs, or reduced level of universal service.

• finance
• funding
• liberalization
• management
• organization
• productivity
• regulation
• strategy

• Center for Research in Regulated Industries, Graduate School of Management Rutgers University, Newark, USA

  Michael A. Crew

• Risk Management and Decision Process Center, The Wharton School University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA

  Paul R. Kleindorfer

Policies and ethics