There's been a big drop in mail volume because of the economy. Also, an increasing number of people use the Internet to pay bills and fewer companies advertise through the mail.

What's happening in our economy is mirrored in the Postal Service. It’s fighting a $2.8 billion deficit and is looking for any way to cut back. That could include layoffs.

Over the past year, the Postal Service cut 41,000 jobs through attrition and now has a hiring freeze.

“We're confident and hopeful that will not result in layoffs but the facts speak for themselves,” said Bradley Todd, vice president of the American Postal Workers Union local 888 in Springfield.

Anyone who has six years with the Postal Service is immune to layoffs. Todd is one of them. He has 17 years with the Postal Service.

“It is a very good source of employment, great benefits, good income,” he said.

Todd says many union-represented workers are under contract and have job security through November 2010.

“When we negotiated that one, it was big,” he said, “because, even at that time, the post office was talking about cutting back and doing things.

The Postal Service is seeing if it's possible to staff more walking routes to save on fuel.

“We have to take a very close look at anywhere we can become more efficient and that includes both in sorting the mail and consolidating some of our mail processing operations, which we're in the process of doing right now,” said Todd.

The biggest thing the Postal Service is doing is offering voluntary early retirement to 156,000 employees. Administrators estimate 3 percent to 5 percent of those employees will take them up on it.