The US Postal Service has outlived its usefulness.

The “company” is drowning in debt and can’t pay its benefit obligations to power-hungry unions. Fewer and fewer Americans utilize the snail-mail, 49-cent service, instead resorting to free and instant email and web delivery.

The business model is outdated and unsustainable. First Class mail is rarely utilized, and package delivery is better performed by the private sector with its myriad of options and sustainable business models.

Even the “company” admits, in its own unintentional way, that times are changing and the need is fading away. There are now plans to shutter thousands of post office locations and layoff more than 220,000 workers (it has more than a half-million employees) over the next four years.

Billions in debt. Thousands of locations being shuttered forever. Obligations that can never be fulfilled. A failing and outdated business model. Anywhere else but in the government these are factors leading to bankruptcy and often liquidation. But it’s the government so the unmitigated failure is subsidized and its inevitable death tortuously drawn-out.

Of course, closing the “company” is a source of public controversy. After all, hasn’t the USPS been around since the very founding of America?

No. In fact, the current incarnation of the Postal Service was only established in 1971 through the Postal Reorganization Act. Not 1791 — 1971. You probably have a coin in your pocket that was minted before the birth of the current Postal Service.

The Constitution gives Congress the power to establish mail routes and all that, true. But it doesn’t require Congress to bailout failed, specific business models only created through acts of Congress 40 years ago.

In fact, the old Postal Service established by Ben Franklin no longer exists. That one was called the United States Post Office Department, and it existed from 1792 to 1971 — just shy of 200 years. That version had historical precedent and custom. This version is modern and an unmitigated failure.

So if it’s tradition keeping you from supporting the abolition of the United States Postal Service, keep all of that in mind. We haven’t had the traditional, historic Postal Service in about 40 years. That age of Franklin’s organization is long gone. This newer version is a departure from the past and pariah on modernity.