Re: The Medieval Postal Service

[Krist van Besien]

On Tue, Jan 09, 2001 at 05:10:30PM -0600, fabio guillermo rojas wrote
> 
> Last summer, I argued with a friend over the privatization of the postal
> service. He said that the postal service already did a good job as 
> one could ask for. A bystander opined that without market forces, how
> could one really know if a job was done efficiently or not?

> With the postal service, I now have an a partial answer. I was 
> reading a Menand's history of the Mediterranean in the 1400's.
> He caclulated that it took about two weeks, during good weather
> and peaceful times, for a package to move from Madrid to Constantinople.
> Not bad. The current postal service offers first class packages in about
> 7-10 working days. CDnow routinely tells customers 14 days is to be
> expected. Interesting.

Evidence of the greater efficency of private postal services does exist
in present time too.
 
Some countries already have privatised their postal service. In the
Netherlands PTT-Post has been privatised and the resulting company has
since then gone global by taking over TNT, thus forming the "TNT-Post
group". They claim to be the first Postal services company publically
listed at the stock exchange.  <www.tntpost-group.com>
The group doesn't enjoy a state sanctioned monopoly any longer, but they
do still have a natural monopoly, as they give very good service, which
makes it harder for a competitor to establish themselves. Competition
does exist at a local level though, with local postal services existing
in some towns. 
Comparing the (private) Dutch post with the still state owned postal
service in other European countries one can only conclude that the Dutch
post performs better.
I've lived both in Belgium and in the Netherlands, two countries of
similar size and population, with similar standards of living and
economic activity (and mostly the same language too...)
In Belgium, the state owned Post doesn't deliver mail on saturdays, the
Dutch Post does.
The Dutch post guarantees delivery by the next working day for ordinary
mail (granted, the country is about the size of Maryland), the Belgian
Post seems to be unable to achieve this in a similar sized country.
The Belgian Post needs governement subsidies, has far to much staff. The
Dutch Post is listed on the stock exchange and pays a dividend...

Enough said I think...

Krist
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Krist van Besien                                        [EMAIL PROTECTED]