Hope this helps to clarify the three possibilities when ‘authorities’ say United States.

  • Most of the time they are speaking about the corporation, panel #3, on the right
  • Other times they are speaking to people who live in the territories and the many employees of the federal government.
  • When the President or VP speaks abroad, they’re talking about The-USofA, door #1 below. By the way, in panel #1, without United States, the postage rate is two cents.

Graphic showing three areas side by side. (1) illustration of the 50 states, with United States of America typed above (2) illustration of DC, Puerto Rico, Guam, and gov't bidg and forts, with United States typed above (3) illustration of a file folder with UNITED STATES in all caps above

Related

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  1. Review these slides
  2. Read this, 
  3. review this diagram of US vs USofA,
  4. read these six PDFs,
  5. watch Richard McDonald's seminar intro
  6. learn to speak like a simple man
  7. If this site ever goes down, the archive is on the wayback machine.