Better get in line at the Post Office now, as things are going to get worse. Facing a deficit that could climb to $6 billion this year, the U.S. Postal Service is considering a range of options to reduce its costs. On the table is everything from raising stamp prices to closing post offices to eliminating a day of mail delivery.

Postmaster General John E. Potter, testifying before a Senate subcommittee yesterday, said the USPS may be forced to shrink mail service to five days a week for the first time in history due to the budget crunch. Mail volume is down by 9 billion pieces in the last year, its largest decline ever, due in part to rising competition from Fedex, a surge in electronic bill-paying, and a slowdown in "standard mail" retail advertising, better known as junk mail.

Since 1912, post office delivery and window service has been available every day but Sunday. But the regular visits from your friendly letter carrier are mighty expensive. Studies by the Post Office and independent reviewers anticipate savings of $1.9 billion to $3.5 billion with the elimination of one delivery day each week.

The cutback would target Tuesdays or Saturdays, as they are the two slowest days for mail currently.    

"It is possible that the cost of six-day delivery may simply prove to be unaffordable," Potter said at the hearing. Both Congress and the Post Office board of governors would have to approve any change to the schedule, which would impact USPS's 700,000 employees.

OhMyGov! previously reported on a postal worker in Wisconsin who anticipated her agency's economic plight and started up a freelance business from her USPS mail truck. That business: delivering crack cocaine.

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