Stamp prices are increasing to 49 cents on Sunday, the first increase since January 2014, but the cost of postcards, letters traveling internationally, and additional letter ounces will remain the same, according to the U.S. Postal Service.
The First Class mail Forever stamp increase is a return to 49 cents, which was the price before the Postal Service was forced to reduce the price to the current 47 cents by the Postal Regulatory Commission in 2016 as part of its exigent surcharge removal, the Postal Service said in a statement.
"If you're wondering why the stamp price is going back up, you can blame inflation: USPS has to periodically adjust the price of postage to stay consistent with the average annual rate of inflation,"Money magazine writer Madeline Farber said.
Forever stamps purchased before the price increase remain valid.
"Once it's purchased, it never expires or declines in value, but at the time of purchase, it's sold at the first-class one-ounce rate. You can use it forever," Elizabeth Najduch, the Postal Service's spokeswoman for metro Detroit, Flint and Jackson, told the Detroit Free Press.
Lynne Golodner, the chief creative officer of the Michigan-based public relations firm Your People, told the Free Press she was "stunned" by the increase.
"It feels like we just had another increase," Golodner, who purchases stamps in bulk, said to the newspaper. "It's an inconvenience, I am kind of old-fashioned. I use stamps, I pay bills by mail. I mail out checks to employees. I guess I could a lot of that digitally, but I just don't."
The Postal Service complained last spring when the Postal Regulatory Commission ordered the rollback of the first-class stamp by two cents.
"Given our precarious financial condition and ongoing business needs, the price reduction required by the PRC exacerbates our losses," Megan J. Brennan, Postmaster General said in a statement last April. "This unfortunate decision heightens the importance of the review of our ratemaking system which our regulator is required to conduct later this year."
© 2023 Newsmax. All rights reserved.