Clickin’ will embiggen
The United States Postal Service has long lived on the financial edge, but it has never been as close to the precipice as it is today: the agency is so low on cash that it will not be able to make a $5.5 billion payment due this month and may have to shut down entirely this winter unless Congress takes emergency action to stabilize its finances. “Our situation is extremely serious,” the postmaster general, Patrick R. Donahoe, said in an interview. “If Congress doesn’t act, we will default.”
In recent weeks, Mr. Donahoe has been pushing a series of painful cost-cutting measures to erase the agency’s deficit, which will reach $9.2 billion this fiscal year. They include eliminating Saturday mail delivery, closing up to 3,700 postal locations and laying off 120,000 workers, nearly one-fifth of the agency’s work force. The post office’s problems stem from one hard reality: it is getting squeezed on both revenue and costs.
As any computer user knows, the Internet revolution has led to people and businesses sending far less conventional mail.
At the same time, decades of contractual promises made to unionized workers, including no-layoff clauses, are increasing the post office’s costs. Labor represents 80 percent of the agency’s expenses, compared with 53 percent at United Parcel Service and 32 percent at FedEx, its two biggest private competitors. Postal workers also receive more generous health benefits than most other federal employees. Missing the $5.5 billion payment due on Sept. 30, intended to finance retirees’ future health care, won’t cause immediate disaster. But sometime early next year, the agency will run out of money to pay its employees and gas up its trucks, officials warn, forcing it to stop delivering the roughly three billion pieces of mail it handles weekly.
Fed Ex is horrible and UPS mercilessly beats their drivers*. I’ve always thought that USPS has done a good job…at least until recently. That said..where will we get the money to bail them out? Maybe..we need to rob a bank or two.
*sarcasm – (I don’t think I’ve ever seen a UPS driver that wasn’t busting his butt.)
Its a shame so many of you regular ‘experts’ are clueless on the subject matter. Do some homework from unbiased sources!
#32–mib==may I copy your post as a boilerplate on how to make an empty vacuous meaningless statement on any thread in the world should I feel to lazy to think about anything and yet still wish to make my presence known?
and because I do fear you are too stupid to get the point: you are being too conclusionary and not offering up any facts or analysis to make your conclusion relevant.
What facts are wrong? What analysis is more relevant?
Take Brian from Boston for instance. I don’t know if property and other taxes were included in the comparison or not–but its a smart comment. He says WHY the comparison is wrong. Imagine if he had posted just as you did. We would know nothing except that in such a case, he would be the same idiot as you.
Hmmmm. Note to self: when posting as stupidly as mib, use his name as well.
HAW—HAW!!!!! What a dope.
Ooooo Someone got their panties in a bunch.
MY message (again) was there is lots of misinformation posted here and readers should not confuse the regular blogger’s posts as complete facts, and i encourage everyone to do more research and consider the source. Am i allowed to say that?
I apologize if I’m not posting to your standards Mr. Dayjob blogger professional fact extractor & entertainer extraordinaire. Welcome to America. We post freely here.
It’s gotten to the point that even the New York Times has bought in to the line that the US Postal Service is about to go under due to declining mail volumes and overly generous wages and benefits for its employees. This morning’s Times trumpets “Postal Service Is Nearing Default as Losses Mount“. The Times fails to explain that the $5.5 billion payment is not a normal, actuarially valid estimate of future retiree’s health benefits. It is a politically calculated number, equal to the amount the USPS was found to be overpaying its annual pension liabilities in 2003. The trust fund simply serves to keep postal funds flowing into the Treasury, artificially reducing the federal deficit.
The most glaring omission in the Times story is the fact that as of the end of the 2010 fiscal year, the USPS had amassed a total of $42.5 billion in the so-called “trust fund”. (See page 77 of the USPS Annual Report). The fact that the Times ignores this huge pile of cash, while parroting the cliche “The United States Postal Service has long lived on the financial edge” just shows how successful right wing politicians and the USPS leadership have been in shaping the perception of the USPS as a financial basket case, requiring draconian measures to “save” it.
The simple, undisputed fact is that without Congress’s prefunding requirement, the USPS would have zero debt, billions in spare cash, and a $15 billion line of credit. But when your goal is to shut down post offices, get rid of unions, and slash wages and benefits, you need a better story. The politicians have managed to come up with that story, and so far, the news media have swallowed it whole.
#34–to mib, or anyone else I disagree with: you are just totally wrong. Its plain for anyone to see your basic facts are incorrect. You just don’t know what you are talking about. Did you ever graduate from high school or are you home schooled?
You should look it up on the internet and just see how wrong you are.
So, simple to be so simple.
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I gave you your error, how to correct it, and an example of good posting. YOU choose to stay in the same rut.
I guess I need a pole axe. You post like Pedro. HAW, HAW. ((Thats his donkey for those of you unfamiliary with barnyard sounds.))
A solution is to cut weekend delivery immediately and begin the process of reducing headcount and benefits to new workers. This should have been done a decade ago.
We need a viable government run postal service that provides basic delivery of messages written on dead trees for a while longer.
The UPS’s of the world are not interested in delivering a piece of mail 3,000 miles away to some Republican yahoo in Buttfuck, Mississippi for 44cents.
They make money buy skimming the top end of the mail delivery market.
This is on the tv news up here right now… They mention $438 MILLION profit last year for the Canadian post office. Stamp price is nearly the same as in the US. Apparently there are some improvements to the USPO that could be made to turn things around. I have no memory of when there was Saturday delivery up here… so long ago… Go back far enough in time, and there was 2 deliveries per day too! Overkill.
Raise the stamp price to $0.50. Then increment it in the future by $0.10 jumps only. This odd- penny crap has got to stop!
If the last jump had been to $0.50/stamp base, instead of the stupid, incomputable $0.44 bull crap we saw, how far in debt would they have been right now? Bupkiss? A little?
Charge more for the flyers, the junk mass mailings and the cheezy crap my mailbox sees as 78% of what goes in.
Let the advertisers get more creative. Instead of super-tabloid print, let them send me small notes with computer pattern-codes (QR) that lead to on-line incentives. If a supermarket saves me a buck with printable coupons or a dollar off my next visit, they’ve spent their advertising buck more efficiently and saved my postman’s back.
The founding fathers knew that a vibrant postal system was an essential element for a free society. It’s time we tarred and feathered anybody –ANYBODY– who talks of suspending that.
#42 great points. The capitalists are taking advantage of tax payer funded mail system to fill our boxes with shit.
Double the fees for junk mail or they can have FEDX do it cheaper than 8 cents.
Better yet, have the trillion dollar defense dept own the post office and employ their international police force employees right here delivering mail.
What’s a post office?
Will I still get mail delivered to my mailbox at home ?
Or will i have to walk 5 miles to some supermail box to pick up my mail and packages ?
Its a lonely walk in the cold
#24 — I’ll take your request at face value so here is the explanation —- an alien race of jokesters points their super awesome mega laser at our moon to send a permanent tweak which we’ll have to view every time we look up at the full moon forever, but they misspell it.
Pretty funny stuff, huh? 🙂
The founding fathers drove horse and buggies and used old rifles to defend themselves
Does that mean that we should not use cars, airplanes and heat out homes with modern gas furnaces ?
Welcome to life in 2011
This is standard procedure for the Post Office and Amtrak. Give us our money, or we will do the following things you, and particularly your voters, will dislike. Shut down Saturday mail, the local post office, the most popular train routes, etc. It’s never the easiest cuts that get mentioned.
#46–Plus/Minus==thank you. Jokes do lose their edge when they have to be explained. I get it. It is funny. It did lose its edge.
I didn’t have enough context to see what was happening from frame to frame. Maybe it was because I was Watching Mike Rowe on Dirty Jobs exterminate Lamprey Eels? THAT is funny too if you share my context.
Words. /// Images /// Its as bad as assuming someone will get any private assumption?
Agree with the Post Offce propsed cuts on Saturday delivery in addition to the Lord’s day. Like airlines do, the should suspend service to all unpopular, unprofitable routes like the state of Alabama.
Shut it down. Fire everyone. If all of that mail is so important it will find a way to get to it’s destination.
But, I think it’s not as essential as it seems.
Right?
The USPS has a history of very aggressive raises for employees that exceed both the Federal civil service and the USMIL. Their rationale was that they were paying out of their own receipts, so they could distribute the cash however they wanted to.
If they have to run to Uncle Sam now it looks pretty foolish. They are now trying to cut staff rather than renegotiate the contracts downward to maintain staffing and service.
I don’t think you can generalize across all unions, but this is looks like the classic conservative knock against them.
It’s not good to play to stereotype.
When did I miss that mailmen were overpaid welfare types benefiting from this government monopoly. The rap used to be that the job drove people crazy, or postal.
Pity the general culture now want to “tear down” those at the bottom.
Makes sense though. I best most of them don’t pay much by way on income tax and NONE of these chislers probably pay capital gains or inheritance taxes like real people do.
Silly Hoomans.
Oh my look at those aggressive pay raises.
http://apwu.org/news/nsb/2011/nsb01-110314-contract-tentative.htm
1%….wait 1.5%…how dare they?
I’m with Bennie Franklin # 35 on this one. They’re doing fine, the accounting process makes them look bad,.
#35 Yay for Bennie. Great insightful post.
Compare to the blather of #55. Teabagged Dude appears to be in a margarita induced hysteria mentioning everything except Healthcare and Las vegas.
Oh wait. That’s in there. Never mind.
#53
I always try to call it fair, and with decent evidence when possible:
http://postalemployeenetwork.com/postal-employee-salary-history.htm
Sorry, my last post was going to #54, not bobbo at #53. 🙁
I heard this morning that without funding the Federal Aviation Administration would shut down soon.
Without Funding: I heard this morning that the Department of Transportation would shut down soon.
Then the United States Postal Service.
The conservative consensus seems to be that the way to improve the economy is to cut everyone’s pay.
Let the USPS go bankrupt in order to break the union contracts. We did it with GM and Chrysler. Then drop weekend service, and raise the price of stamps to 50 cents.
How are other countries dealing with their postal systems? They must be in the same boat the as the US. I’m sure their citizens are using less and less mail as more and more goes online.
I don’t have any sympathy for our old USPS. They can’t deliver the mail. They are slowest people on the planet. It takes them a minimum of 20 minutes to deal with each customer. What the hell takes so damn long? If I have to go the post office at lunch I know it is going to take over an hour of watching the slowest humans on earth go through their motions.
Near LAX is a station that I had the unfortunate luck of having to use. No joke. I thought the employees were statues. The two women behind the counter could not have moved slower if they tried. It would take them 10 minutes to to turn around.
Excuse me, I am a postal spouse.On insurance-We do not have dental or vision in with our insurance and the options are more expense than paying out of pocket. Our insurance has less coverage than most coal miners,IBM,Motorala,federal prison emplyees, Eastman, Dupont and most hospital employees. The shortfall is contrived. By Congress decision the USPS is not permitted to have a profit. It is supposed to “balance”. And the non union employees are forced to pay a ridiculous amount into a retirement plan that seems to be available to USPS for other uses. They have made cuts at the post office levels, but not to upper and mid management. USPS hid profits to screw employees out of raises.(That was proven by investigation for 2008-2009 years). USPS works with UPS & Fed Ex to assist with deliveries “last mile” program where packages are taken to post office & mail persons deliver them with mail. Just the facts. Pick on IBM,Motorola, Dell,Federal Prision and your County employees.Our county bus drivers have better benefits than USPS!
#11 Ah_Yea said…
Did you notice that Washington Examiner editorial you linked to was written by Rep. Darrel Issa?
This is the same Darrel Issa who the NYT profiled recently has managed to greatly line his own pockets greatly by mixing his business interest with government contracts. He is not above wasting tax payer dollars and abusing the power of his office.
So I don’t really put a lot of credibility in the crap that comes out of this man’s mouth.
http://tinyurl.com/3tu3xwz
I work for the Post Office and in our station they’ve eliminated many routes and now because of the FSS Machines, we only spend 1 hour in the office preparing and 7 hours in the field. We have no extra people and people have lost their routes. About 20 years ago the union agreed to have concessions for lay-off so USPS can lay people off. We are going into contract negotiations so I am not sure if some of the doom and gloom is because of that. It’s a good paying job but we pick our health plan and mine costs me about 500 a month. And I’m in the old retirement so I need to work 40 years and 11 months to get 80% of my highest 3 years. It is a physical job and many carriers need hip or knee replacements.
I think they should offer an early out like Ford did so younger people can have a good paying job. The government should LOWER the age of Medicare so more 50 and 60 year olds would retire and there would be jobs for young people.