House passes bipartisan postal reform bill that serves the interests of rural residents and their newspapers

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, left, didn't like the much higher
sample-copy limit pushed by Rep. James Comer, right; Comer won.

The House passed the landmark Postal Service Reform Act Tuesday night in a 342-92 vote, sending to the Senate a bill that addresses key financial solvency issues of the service and advances the interests of rural residents and their newspapers. The bill received strong bipartisan support, capturing a majority of both party caucuses, and enjoys "considerable partisan support" in the Senate, Nicholas Wu and Hailey Fuchs report for Politico.

The bill would allow newspapers to mail many more sample copies to non-subscribers in their home counties at the same rate they pay the Postal Service to deliver papers to subscribers. The current limit is 10 percent of annual home-county circulation, enacted more than a century ago; the bill would make it 50%, which would only boost subscription appeals but provide total market coverage for advertisers that don't normally advertise in newspapers.

Also "among its provisions, the bill would require Postal Service retirees to enroll in Medicare and eliminates the requirement that the agency prefund its retiree health benefits for 75 years in the future, saving the beleaguered agency tens of billions of dollars over the next decade," Wu and Fuchs report. A financially solvent Postal Service is critical to rural America since for-profit delivery services often find it unprofitable to serve rural areas.

The bill "would also mandate that the Postal Service create a dashboard with performance data and continue to deliver at least six days each week," Wu and Fuchs report. The six-day delivery requirement is already in effect, but was in play during negotiations.

National Newspaper Association Chair Brett Wesner lauded the bill in a news release: "We greatly appreciate the hard work of Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-New York, and James Comer, R-Kentucky, in crafting a bill that drew wide bipartisan support, despite some unaccountable resistance. These two leaders came up with a complex bill that will give USPS some financial running room and, more importantly, demonstrate to the nation that we value this national treasure, the U.S. Postal Service."

Walmart and similar big-box stores win the pandemic with one-stop shopping; some small, rural retailers in trouble

Walmart and other big-box stores like Target and Home Depot have reported strong third-quarter earnings, The Economist reports.

Simeon Gutman of Morgan Stanley told the magazine (which calls itself a newspaper but is fully digital) that such companies get a huge edge from e-commerce, and can draw from "diverse, global supply chains," to keep products in stock and allow shoppers the convenience of one-stop shopping. That's especially appealing during a pandemic when people are trying to avoid unnecessary trips. 

Growth in retail sales overall is slowing, Mitchell Hartman reports for Marketplace. Retail sales grew less than a third of 1 percent in October, reflecting a gain much weaker than expected and much weaker than September's figures, according to newly released figures from the U.S. Census Bureau. 

Many small retailers in rural areas, who had a harder time accessing federal aid, are having an especially difficult time. Several rural retailers in Garrison, N.D., especially restaurateurs, said it's hard to stay in business when the state orders limit indoor seating, P.J. Walker reports for KX News in Bismarck.

A Garrison florist said her store was doing better than expected, Walker reports, because more people are sending flowers to funerals for covid-19 victims and isolated loved ones in nursing homes.