Selected Articles on the Parcels Post

by Unknown

The Average Haul

The average haul of second-class mail matter, made up of printed reading matter, for every copy of which a regular subscription must be paid, is fixed by and is in proportion to the average density of the population.

To illustrate this, take the city of New York as a starting point. It is the leading publication center in the country, and a larger number of publications entered as second-class matter are issued from the city of New York than from any other one city of the country.

The population of New York state in 1906 was estimated to be 8,226,990. The population of the state of New York alone is as large as that of the whole western half of the United States, and yet that whole western half of our territorial area contains only about one-tenth of the entire population of the country.

The average number of subscribers receiving regular publications through the mails as second-class matter in proportion to population is as large in the one state of New York as in the entire western half of the United States. So the Postoffice Department would serve in New York state, within an area of 48,204 square miles of closely settled territory, as many subscribers for second-class mail matter as it would be compelled to serve over a sparsely settled region in the west covering 1,513,394 square miles, that being the area of the western half of the United States, not including Hawaii and Alaska.

Second-Class Mail Matter

An average length of haul of second-class mail matter now carried by the national government would be much greater if limited to the one state of New York and the western half of the United States, than if applied to the entire country; for the very simple reason that the vast sparsely settled area in the west would comprise one-half of the total number of subscribers served; whereas if the whole United States were included, then the western half with its sparse population would embrace only one-tenth of the whole number served, and nine-tenths would be located in the more closely settled eastern half of the United States.

In other words, in averaging the length of haul of second-class matter, nine-tenths of the people served are in closely settled territory, where they are reached by the short haul, and only one-tenth in the thinly settled western half of the country, to be served by the long haul, and oftentimes by the most difficult and expensive methods of transportation.