Posted on 11/15/2011 2:19:21 PM PST by bestintxas
The U.S. Postal Service released its annual financial results on Tuesday, and they're nothing to write home about.
The agency reported an annual loss of $5.1 billion, as declining mail volumes and mounting benefit costs take their toll. The Postal Service said its losses would have been roughly $10.6 billion if not for the passage of legislation postponing a $5.5 billion payment required to fund retiree health benefits.
PrintCommentRevenues from First-Class Mail, the Postal Service's largest and most profitable product, declined 6% from the previous fiscal year to $32 billion. Total mail volume declined by 3 billion pieces, or 1.7%.
"The continuing and inevitable electronic migration of First-Class Mail, which provides approximately 49 percent of our revenue, underscores the need to streamline our infrastructure and make changes to our business model," Postal Service CFO Joe Corbett said in a statement accompanying the figures.
Postmaster General and CEO Patrick Donahoe said in the statement that the Postal Service must reduce its annual costs by $20 billion by the end of 2015 to return to profitability.
Last year's losses hit $8.5 billion, despite deep cuts in expenses and staffing. Mail volume is down more than 20% over the past four years.
(Excerpt) Read more at money.cnn.com ...
I’d like your TV too. Just carry it down to the corner and I’ll pick it up. Save the costs of an armed break-in.
Fedex tracking just notified me earlier that my package was left at the porch, no signature required. Whose porch they they left the package on, they did not say. This is the second time they have done this in less than 3 weeks.
“Huh? Never know it by the amount of stuff we get. People don’t do a lot of personal correspondence these days, but from businesses to the consumer, there is plenty of market.”
Hate to go high school economics on you, but in order for a market to exist, there needs to be a buyer and seller.
The buyer must be able to afford the product and the seller must be able to make a profit.
The USPS is a failed venture as it cannot survive without government subsidies.
Therefore, the USPS must be abolished.
I could Iive with no mail. Just electronic. Some people need mail and don’t want to do computers. As we old-timers pass on, that won’t be an issue.
If I were the benign dictator, we would announce a 5 year phase out of the postal service. Close more buildings faster and start selling.
Cut deliveries to 5 days every two weeks. Two days this week and 3 days next week in half the area and reverse for the other half. Start retiring and working on lay-off schedule.
Any private carrier in an area or state must offer service to every one at least once a week.
Next.
Simply because the FedEx guy cannot find your front porch is not enough reason for the USPS to shake eight billion dollars out of the tax payer.
The answer is the number of pieces of mail will be greatly reduced.
Who else but the U.S. government can get away with dumping 20,000 tons of freaking junk mail on us daily, then demand a raise?
If you announce a 5 year phase out of the USPS, either FedEx or UPS or others will revise their business plans or other companies will fill any void where there is a demand.
“Therefore, the USPS must be abolished.”
Glad you are so willing to tank so many businesses that depend on it for billing, payment and product delivery, but to each his own. I think there is a lot of room to restructure service and pricing, especially with regards to junk mailers, to fix the system.
If there is a market for delivering 150 billion pieces of mail, Fed Ex or someone else will fill that market.
“As for the internet. Good luck. I would be willing to bet over 50% of the population doesn’t user any sort of e-billing service whatsoever.”
Simply because 50% of the population refuse to use e-billing does not mean the tax payer should keep the USPS afloat.
After all, we are not communists.
I can’t argue definitively as I know just about nothing about postal service personnel operations. I do know something doesn’t seem correct tho. I carried on a fairly long conversation with the young postal employee and am sure he would have mentioned his being a disabled veteran as we discussed salaries at length.
I used to have a substitute carrier who didn’t look a day over 16 tho I guess she would have had to be at least 18. She was about as pretty as a girl gets. I wondered how such a young girl got the job. Probably just showed up and smiled sweetly at someone.
Mail?
90 percent of everything Americans get is junk mail, which they never asked for.
I understand the USPS is now dumping about 20,000 tons of junk mail on us daily.
That is the free market’s creation, not usps.
It's possible your young friend was faking it, or maybe he was sharing a job. We had that problem years back in the San Francisco area. You'd get half a dozen hippies doing that.
It wasn't lawful. Postal officials would fire them when they'd catch them.
Gee, what a (non) surprise.
No this was the Page Belcher Federal Building in Tulsa which was owned by the Post Office. The other Federal Agencies rented from the P.O.
This kid was very clean cut and I doubt the P.O. in Tulsa was too in to hiring hippies, at least in that era.
No wonder they’re losing money. It cost me $5.10 to mail a 14 ounce package from one side of the county to the other! That’s a total ripoff.
Pardon me the the post office is funded purely by the cost of postage. I didn’t read anything suggesting a bailout. In fact they have repeatedly stated that they want to close post offices and reduce staffing to become solvent. It’s CONGRESS preventing that.
Mail?
90 percent of everything Americans get is junk mail, which they never asked for.
I understand the USPS is now dumping about 20,000 tons of junk mail on us daily.
That is the free market’s creation, not usps.
Nice excuse for filling everyone mail box with unwanted crap on a daily basis.
Since this is all based on markets, can I charge the USPS one hour per week for the time it takes me to dispose of it? In addition, can I charge them or assign them a portion of my waste disposal bill since they are taking up 20 percent of my trash capacity?
Well?
All based on the market don't ya know!
“Glad you are so willing to tank so many businesses that depend on it for billing, payment and product delivery...”
I have a real estate business and manage to do quite well with very minimal use of USPS.
If I can do that with a small business, everyone else in business should be able to do so as well.
If not, they will fail and someone else will enter the market to fill the void.
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