US Post Office Nearing Default as Losses Mount

[Dusty]

lol I put this in this forum because it's just the same old, tired BS the left, with the help of rags like the NYT, has been getting away with over and over again. This example of Stimulus Pre-conditioning comes just in time for the "Jobs Speech"...


http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/05/bu...vant.html?_r=1


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 — despite a no-layoffs clause in the unions’ contracts.

The post office’s problems stem from one hard reality: it is being 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.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee will hold a hearing on the agency’s predicament on Tuesday. So far, feuding Democrats and Republicans in Congress, still smarting from the brawl over the federal debt ceiling, have failed to agree on any solutions. It doesn’t help that many of the options for saving the postal service are politically unpalatable.

“The situation is dire,” said Thomas R. Carper, the Delaware Democrat who is chairman of the Senate subcommittee that oversees the postal service. “If we do nothing, if we don’t react in a smart, appropriate way, the postal service could literally close later this year. That’s not the kind of development we need to inject into a weak, uneven economic recovery.”

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.

The causes of the crisis are well known and immensely difficult to overcome.

Mail volume has plummeted with the rise of e-mail, electronic bill-paying and a Web that makes everything from fashion catalogs to news instantly available. The system will handle an estimated 167 billion pieces of mail this fiscal year, down 22 percent from five years ago.

It’s difficult to imagine that trend reversing, and pessimistic projections suggest that volume could plunge to 118 billion pieces by 2020. The law also prevents the post office from raising postage fees faster than inflation.

Meanwhile, the agency has had a tough time cutting its costs to match the revenue drop, with a history of labor contracts offering good health and pension benefits, underused post offices, and laws that restrict its ability to make basic business decisions, like reducing the frequency of deliveries.

Congress is considering numerous emergency proposals — most notably, allowing the post office to recover billions of dollars that management says it overpaid to its employees’ pension funds. That fix would help the agency get through the short-term crisis, but would delay the day of reckoning on bigger issues.

The agency’s leaders acknowledge that they must find a way to increase revenue, something that will prove far harder than simply slicing costs.

In some countries, post offices double as banks or sell insurance or cellphones. In the United States, the postal service is barred from entering many areas. Still, the agency is considering ideas, like gaining the right to deliver wine and beer, allowing commercial advertisements on postal trucks and in post offices, doing more “last-mile” deliveries for FedEx and U.P.S. and offering special hand-delivery services for correspondence and transactions for which e-mail is not considered secure enough.


Snip

[Pete]

".......... 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. ................."

Unions can kill a private company but not government. Look for increased spending to bail them out - or maybe a user tax on e-mails.

[mojaveman]

I agree. The only way to save it is to start running it like a business and not leave it the over-inflated inefficient bureaucracy that it is. I quit using the USPS a long time ago. The folks at the competition do a better job and have better customer service.

[longrange1947]

It needs to go bankrupt, go into receivership, and all labor contracts canceled.

Start all over again and get the deadwood out. This would allow the organization to start running in the black again, without the onerous labor deals made under "political threats and promises".

The main advantage of the postal service is magazines ands cards.

Originally Posted by longrange1947

It needs to go bankrupt, go into receivership, and all labor contracts canceled.

Start all over again and get the deadwood out. This would allow the organization to start running in the black again, without the onerous labor deals made under "political threats and promises".

The main advantage of the postal service is magazines ands cards.

Make it a volunteer labor of love, like cross-walk duty in front of the elem school.

That's what ol' Ben Franklin would say.

[Team Sergeant]

What next, run the United States of America into default?

obama;

"We're working on that right now"

Originally Posted by Team Sergeant

What next, run the United States of America into default?

obama;

"We're working on that right now"

When the shit goes on sale, I'm attending a HUMVEE auction, opening bid, $500.00

[The Reaper]

Hey, if civilianizing/commercializing space flight is the way to go to save money, why not apply that to mail delivery as well?

The postal service has an overweight, inefficient workforce of mostly less than productive union members. They overcharge most residential customers to subsidize those in remote areas and bulk mailers.

They have a monopoly and are subsidsized by the taxpaying customers.

They have raised rates to the point that it is easier and more efficient to email, FedEx, or deliver the mail in person. Literally, they have raised rates to overpay their workforce of union employees to the point that they are no longer economically competitive or even viable.

If you do not believe that, remove the limit and let a common carrier like FedEx and UPS start competing home mail delivery and see how quickly the USPS fades.

TR

[GratefulCitizen]

Originally Posted by Dusty

[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.

This is downright idiotic.
You can have the nice package or protection from layoffs -- not both (there is no such thing as a free lunch).

If a no-layoff clause were negotiated in the next UPS contract, I would go find a different job.
Bankrupting the company is not a productive goal.

The Drudge report shows more union rhetoric in action.
This is not about helping workers(union or non-union), it is about consolidating power in the hands of union leadership.

Glad I live in a RTW state.
This keeps the union responsive to actual interests of members (including the long-term profitability of the company), rather than narrow leadership interests.

Originally Posted by The Reaper

They have a monopoly and are subsidsized by the taxpaying customers.

They have raised rates to the point that it is easier and more efficient to email, FedEx, or deliver the mail in person. Literally, they have raised rates to overpay their workforce of union employees to the point that they are no longer economically competitive or even viable.

If you do not believe that, remove the limit and let a common carrier like FedEx and UPS start competing home mail delivery and see how quickly the USPS fades.

TR

Many people don't realize that we're forbidden by law from delivering letters smaller than a certain size.

Here in Page, the biggest delivery stop (in terms of piece count) is the post office.
It's more cost effective for businesses to pay both UPS and USPS for delivery than to use just the USPS distribution system.

[Pete]

Originally Posted by GratefulCitizen

..........Here in Page, the biggest delivery stop (in terms of piece count) is the post office.................

I found that out tracking orders. Used to track them all the way to the door. First lost package went into the USPS for home delivery. Never got it.

See that more and more nowdays - where it hits the USPS office for delivery.

[Eagle5US]

Originally Posted by Pete

I found that out tracking orders. Used to track them all the way to the door. First lost package went into the USPS for home delivery. Never got it.

See that more and more nowdays - where it hits the USPS office for delivery.

Folks are still waiting, now 5 weeks, for their T-Shirts that I paid priority postage on.

I filled out all of the mail forwarding paperwork for this deployment, and have received less than 10 pieces of mail in the last 4 months. When I called the PO, they told me that the only way to ENSURE my mail was forwarded, was to pay $15 a week for their premium service which bundled my incoming PO Box mail, and had it sent to me once in bulk once a week. After the first few weeks of calling once a week and complaining, they finally told me that they had nothing more to offer me except the premium service to ensure my mail got delivered.

I then contacted the Regional postmaster who, after referring me back to the original post office a number of times, finally told me the same thing, that in order to ENSURE my mail got forwarded, I needed to utilize their premium service. I finally gave up on it...called the agencies where important shit was supposed to come from (Registration stickers for my vehicle, title for the Vette when I paid it off, etc) and gave them this address to mail it direct.

You would be H A R D P R E S S E D to find a postal worker in ANY post office who is willing to work any faster than their most leisurely, comfortable speed, under the guise of being paid for their time vs earning their money through service to the customer. How often have you stood 15 deep in line at a post-office with only ONE person behind the counter and they open up a second register? There may be one or two....but you can probably count the instances on one hand.

[SF_BHT]

Originally Posted by Pete

I found that out tracking orders. Used to track them all the way to the door. First lost package went into the USPS for home delivery. Never got it.

See that more and more nowdays - where it hits the USPS office for delivery.

I keep tracking my few USPS packages here in PR. They keep showing up delivered and I do not get them. 3-5 days later it usually shows up. Guess they are trying to keep up the fast delivery stats.... Not....

[Eagle5US]

They don't even offer tracking from APO here in theater...

[greenberetTFS]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

Hey, if civilianizing/commercializing space flight is the way to go to save money, why not apply that to mail delivery as well?

The postal service has an overweight, inefficient workforce of mostly less than productive union members. They overcharge most residential customers to subsidize those in remote areas and bulk mailers.

They have a monopoly and are subsidsized by the taxpaying customers.

They have raised rates to the point that it is easier and more efficient to email, FedEx, or deliver the mail in person. Literally, they have raised rates to overpay their workforce of union employees to the point that they are no longer economically competitive or even viable.

If you do not believe that, remove the limit and let a common carrier like FedEx and UPS start competing home mail delivery and see how quickly the USPS fades.

TR

I completely concur..............

Big Teddy

[SF_BHT]

There have been over 168 arrested here in PR since Jan 2011. Guess they need more Taxpayer money so they do not have to subsidize their income and we will not have to put so many in jail.