I can think of only one reason to continue U.S. Postal Service delivery on Saturdays: An astonishing number of Americans still believe in Santa Claus.

In a poll of 500 registered voters taken in December by an outfit called Public Policy Polling, 52% of those surveyed said they believe in the obese, old elf. Another 3% said they were not sure.

This compared with only 6% for the Tooth Fairy and 5% for the Easter Bunny.

USPS has been managing Santa's mail for more than 100 years. It used to run "Operation Santa Claus" out of its main New York building. That's the one with the famous inscription that reads, "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds," but doesn't mention anything about perennial obstruction from a dysfunctional Congress.

Operation Santa has since been decentralized to many post offices across the country. USPS also has launched Santa's blog, Twitter and Facebook pages. But Santa still gets millions of handwritten letters a year—often from poor children.

USPS lost nearly $16 billion in its last fiscal year, mostly because of rigorous pension obligations that Congress somehow imposes on it but no other governmental agency. Some of the losses are the result of information technology, online bill-paying, competition from United Parcel Service and FedEx, higher fuel costs and a prolonged economic slump.

Last week, Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe said he wants most Saturday mail delivery to go the way of the Pony Express. This, he said, would save $2 billion a year if Congress doesn't stop him.

Predictable objections immediately spewed forth from unions seeking to preserve obsolete jobs and farmers who still can't get reliable Internet access in 2013.

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins (R., Maine) issued this statement: "The Postal Service is the linchpin of a $1 trillion mailing and mail-related industry that employs more than eight million Americans in fields as diverse as direct mail, printing, catalog companies, magazine and newspaper publishing and paper manufacturing."

It was not an impressive defense since most of the businesses she mentioned are in structural decline. Even Netflix will stop mailing DVDs if its streaming service continues catching on. Meantime, package delivery—the part of USPS that isn't in decline—will continue on Saturdays, so plenty of viable commerce will continue as usual.

Times have changed so rapidly that USPS would not be greatly missed if it cut Saturday mail deliveries. It would not be greatly missed if it cut back to three days a week.

What's so urgent? Junk mail, medical bills, credit-card deals and offers from dubious local contractors? When my son was eight, he received an unsolicited offer to subscribe to Playboy. Surely, this could have waited.

I would rather deal with a cable company, a phone company or any bureaucratic nightmare of a utility company than stand in line at the post office. This is a money-losing organization that reportedly paid more than $30 million to sponsor Lance Armstrong and the blood-doping U.S. cycling team. Yet when you are in line at the post office, nobody is racing to do anything.

They're nothing like Santa, who can deliver millions of packages all over the globe in a single night. So why do we need them on Saturdays? And if you really believe in Santa, and write him letters, ask yourself this: Why would he need USPS at all?
