Traditional snail mail is becoming a less and less important part of our lives, and, not unconnectedly, Canada Post is having trouble with its bottom line.
The beleaguered Crown corporation reported a $1.3 billion operating loss in 2024, as both the numbers of traditional packages and letters, and revenue from delivering them, declined. Canada Post hasn't been in the black since 2017.
Along with the financial woes come labour woes: Canada Post and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers may or may not be staggering toward the second strike in a few months. CUPW has been in a legal strike position since late May.
In mid-May, a report that warned that Canada Post faced an "existential crisis" suggested, among other things, that the mail service abandon daily home mail delivery.
It makes a certain amount of sense. A generation ago, time-sensitive things like bills, cheques and weekly magazines regularly came in the mail, but they've been steadily replaced by their electronic successors.
A resounding 81 per cent of readers would be fine with weekly home mail delivery, a Village Media online poll showed this week.
New Democrats are most against the idea:
As are low-income readers:
In general, readers with union sympathies or a history of union membership are most opposed to the idea:
There is very little difference by sex:
In a reversal of the graph I was expecting, younger readers are most against the idea:
And dog people are perhaps very slightly more in favour than cat people: