Not necessarily. There's a big question facing the Post Office right now that becomes acute in the next few months, which is whether the US government will bail out its pension fund, which is utterly and completely unsustainable. Google "post office pension" for things like [1], in which it becomes evident that however they may be not the Federal government de jure they sure are a part of the Federal government de facto, just as trying to pretend Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac are fully independent entities whose actions are wholly their own and have nothing to do with the government is a complete joke. At the very least they have the same special Moral Hazard relationship that the Federal government does not extend to just any "entirely separate business entity".
(The only thing that would be any different if they were an officially recognized Federal agency is that instead of worrying about whether they might in the future cost us billions of dollars in pensions by act of Congress, they would have already cost us billions of dollars in pensions by act of Congress.)
I'm way more interested in de facto relationships that de jure. You can say anything you want legally, what matters is the actual relationships.
(The only thing that would be any different if they were an officially recognized Federal agency is that instead of worrying about whether they might in the future cost us billions of dollars in pensions by act of Congress, they would have already cost us billions of dollars in pensions by act of Congress.)
I'm way more interested in de facto relationships that de jure. You can say anything you want legally, what matters is the actual relationships.
[1]: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/jun/22/justice-depa...