The Week

■ According to a poll by the Baltimore News American, 74 per cent weren’t sure they would vote against suspended governor Marvin Mandel, notwithstanding his conviction for bribery and conspiracy. And in Illinois, a candidate for the state legislature has won his primary despite being charged with eight counts of flashing at schoolgirls. We’re off to another normal election year.

■ The supposedly modest postal union settlement—a 19.5 per cent pay increase over three years—would be more comforting if postal wages had not already risen a third faster than average private wages since 1971, ending up almost 50 per cent higher. The Postal Service is obviously burdened by too many idle hands and expensive offices, and not enough modern technology. Seniority rules leave postal workers with little incentive to innovate or upgrade their skills; monopoly and federal subsidies ($1.8 billion) leave postal managers with little incentive to watch costs. An excellent new American Enterprise Institute study of these issues by Professor Douglas Adie concludes that the best way to improve postal service and to restrain costs is to denationalize the business and end the postal monopoly on first class mail.

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■ According to a poll by the Baltimore News American, 74 per cent weren’t sure they would vote against suspended governor Marvin Mandel, notwithstanding his conviction for bribery and conspiracy. And in Illinois, a candidate for the state legislature has won his primary despite being charged with eight counts of flashing at schoolgirls. We’re off to another normal election year.

■ The supposedly modest postal union settlement—a 19.5 per cent pay increase over three years—would be more comforting if postal wages had not already risen a third faster than average private wages since 1971, ending up almost 50 per cent higher. The Postal Service is obviously burdened by too many idle hands and expensive offices, and not enough modern technology. Seniority rules leave postal workers with little incentive to innovate or upgrade their skills; monopoly and federal subsidies ($1.8 billion) leave postal managers with little incentive to watch costs. An excellent new American Enterprise Institute study of these issues by Professor Douglas Adie concludes that the best way to improve postal service and to restrain costs is to denationalize the business and end the postal monopoly on first class mail.