AI exposure: Postal Service Mail Carriers
Sort and deliver mail for the United States Postal Service (USPS). Deliver mail on established route by vehicle or on foot. Includes postal service mail carriers employed by USPS contractors.
Reading this score
computed37.8% of this occupation's weighted task load is exposed, which puts Postal Service Mail Carriers at the 66th percentile of 923 occupations. The capability is largely there. Its average task scores 2.1 out of 4 on what a current system can produce, and the frictions that hold other jobs in place are comparatively weak here.
What holds the line here is embodiment. Across this occupation's 21 tasks it averages 1.69 out of 3, the highest of the five friction dimensions. In plain terms, the work has to happen in physical space. A language model cannot move matter. Until the robotics to do this work is both good enough and cheap enough to deploy widely, capability in software does not reach it.
The most exposed thing this job does is Leave notices telling patrons where to collect mail that could not be delivered, at 93.3%. The least is Bundle mail in preparation for delivery or transportation to relay boxes, at 0.0%. A gap of 93.3% between two parts of the same job is the reason this index publishes at task level. An occupation-wide number would have hidden both.
Within office and administrative support occupations, this one is less exposed than the median of 55.9% across the group's 51 roles, with 44 scoring higher. Being in an exposed family does not make a particular job exposed, and the reverse holds too.
What would move this score. Of 21 tasks, 13 are currently banded exposed, 0 assisted and 8 untouched. For that distribution to shift materially would take capability alone, since there is little structural friction here to slow adoption once a system can do the work. The score is re-computed every quarter against a fresh capability reference, and the change is published rather than quietly applied.
Task by task
21 tasks, O*NET 31.0| Task | Exposed | Assisted | Untouched | Importance | Band |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leave notices telling patrons where to collect mail that could not be delivered. | 93.3% | 6.7% | 0.0% | 4.38 | exposed |
| Provide customers with change of address cards and other forms. | 93.3% | 6.7% | 0.0% | 3.39 | exposed |
| Scan labels on letters or parcels to confirm receipt. | 86.7% | 13.3% | 0.0% | 4.77 | exposed |
| Maintain accurate records of deliveries. | 80.0% | 20.0% | 0.0% | 4.34 | exposed |
| Sign for cash-on-delivery and registered mail before leaving the post office. | 50.0% | 25.0% | 25.0% | 4.46 | exposed |
| Answer customers' questions about postal services and regulations. | 45.0% | 30.0% | 25.0% | 4.01 | exposed |
| Report any unusual circumstances concerning mail delivery, including the condition of street letter boxes. | 45.0% | 30.0% | 25.0% | 3.25 | exposed |
| Complete forms that notify publishers of address changes. | 45.0% | 30.0% | 25.0% | 3.62 | exposed |
| Record address changes and redirect mail for those addresses. | 39.6% | 22.9% | 37.5% | 4.12 | exposed |
| Obtain signed receipts for registered, certified, and insured mail, collect associated charges, and complete any necessary paperwork. | 35.4% | 27.1% | 37.5% | 4.70 | exposed |
| Register, certify, and insure parcels and letters. | 31.7% | 18.3% | 50.0% | 4.54 | exposed |
| Sell stamps and money orders. | 30.0% | 20.0% | 50.0% | 3.84 | exposed |
| Turn in money and receipts collected along mail routes. | 26.7% | 23.3% | 50.0% | 4.39 | exposed |
| Sort mail for delivery, arranging it in delivery sequence. | 20.0% | 5.0% | 75.0% | 4.63 | untouched |
| Return to the post office with mail collected from homes, businesses, and public mailboxes. | 16.7% | 8.3% | 75.0% | 4.68 | untouched |
| Hold mail for customers who are away from delivery locations. | 16.7% | 8.3% | 75.0% | 4.43 | untouched |
| Return incorrectly addressed mail to senders. | 16.7% | 8.3% | 75.0% | 4.05 | untouched |
| Travel to post offices to pick up the mail for routes or pick up mail from postal relay boxes. | 11.7% | 13.3% | 75.0% | 4.13 | untouched |
| Meet schedules for the collection and return of mail. | 9.2% | 3.3% | 87.5% | 4.58 | untouched |
| Deliver mail to residences and business establishments along specified routes by walking or driving, using a combination of satchels, carts, cars, and small trucks. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.58 | untouched |
| Bundle mail in preparation for delivery or transportation to relay boxes. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.30 | untouched |
Task text and importance ratings sourced from O*NET 31.0. Shares computed. The occupation score is the importance-weighted mean.
Where the score comes from
judgedEvery task is scored through the standardised work activities it maps to. These are this occupation’s averages on the six rubric dimensions. Capability is what AI can do; the other five are what stands in the way.
| Dimension | Mean | Scale |
|---|---|---|
| Capability | 2.12 | 0-4 |
| Embodiment | 1.69 | 0-3 |
| Presence | 0.67 | 0-3 |
| Accountability | 0.48 | 0-3 |
| Context | 1.10 | 0-3 |
| Verification cost | 0.67 | 0-3 |
What this means in practice
Where most of a role's weighted task load is exposed, the work that survives is usually the part of the job nobody wrote into the job description: deciding what should be produced rather than producing it, and being answerable for the result. The tasks lowest on this page are a better guide to where to spend your time than any general advice about the future of work.
Occupations either side of this one
The four closest scores in the same occupational family, then the four closest anywhere in the index.
Read this carefully. Exposure is not displacement. A high score means current AI systems can produce this work, not that anyone will stop paying a person to do it. Adoption depends on economics, regulation and inertia that this index deliberately does not model. How the score is built.