Posted on 09/04/2011 4:49:11 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
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.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I’d be good with M-W-F, and T-Th, on alternating weeks.
If you wanted cluster boxes that can be done ~ may be a good idea for the small towns.
Rural delivery service is MUCH less costly than the expense for keeping a small town postmaster, assistant postmaster and a couple of clerks on the rolls ~ plus there's the rent paid for an unnecessary building.
There are about 28,000 such places that are no longer needed and haven't been since I studied the problem for USPS management back in 1976/77.
the postmaster general, Patrick R. Donahoe, said in an interview. "If Congress doesn't act, we will default."Birds of a feather ping.
They’re begging Congress to “stabilize their finances.” Becuase they’re billions in the red. Tell me that’s not asking for billions from the fedgov. They get government money every year.
ML/NJ
another huge problem with USPS:
49,000 on “disability”
75% of their salary tax free for life
http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2011/01/12/federal-gravy-train-end/
You can look at their annual circulation report (required by law) to find out how many copies they sent ~ if not the cost.
My post office has one full time postmaster, one part time assistant and one part time rural route delivery person these days.
Any reason why Residential mail delivery could not be reduced to one day per week?
For myself 75% of my bills are deducted from my bank account or charged to a credit card.
If I only received mail one day per week, that would be fine with me.
And if they made the mail delivery day the same day as garbage collection, I could throw away the junk mail before it ever got inside the house.
To make this plan happen the USPS would give reduced postage rates to residential customers who opted for weekly service. Within months the USPS would have dramatically cut their costs.
I know. USPS has had contracts with both UPS and Fedex to deliver express/priority mail via their long-haul (airline) routes for years now. And even with this help they still can’t sustain themselves as they are currently operating.
I’d be good with M-W-F, and T-Th, on alternating weeks.
I posted elsewhere that I would be satisfied with one day per week service for residential.
Not just in Birmingham. Pretty much everywhere including here in South Florida. One of the DUmbest moves ever.
Bet it's not all that great a deal to be disabled.
Certainly. In a word, VOLUME. To get everyone their mail and packages they get in a week, it’d have to be longer than a 24 hour day.
You think everyone else has the same mail profile as you? That was your first mistake.
What does UPS have to do with how much money is dumped into the postal service? Start a threat about UPS subsidies if you have an ax to grind.
And it will shut down unless those mean wascally wepublicans approve another stimulus...
Package delivery is one of the things USPS gets right. I have shipped thousands of packages—about 15% of them international—and I’ve never had one domestic package go missing.
Almost all Priority Mail packages get from coast to coast in 2 days. Mail it on Saturday, it arrives on Monday. First Class is almost as fast. In fact, First Class Mail is the best kept secret around. I predict the first thing to go will be First Class parcel service and Media Mail. What they ought to do is quit subsidizing junk mail.
USPS is needed. Many USPS workers and management are not. We have a great post office in our town, friendly, too. GO to Denver and 90% of the workers seem to be foreigners.
This is why you posts are so inane. If the NYT mails 100 copies a day; and the subsidy is $2 per copy mailed then the cost to the USPS would be less than a million dollars a year. Of course it matters if you are whining about it.
But you don't really know, so you just come out with liberal like assertions that it is "common knowledge." (But not so common that you could answer my simple question! And after you're done answering that question, maybe you could tell me why my Post Office is now open fewer hours than my Bank!)
ML/NJ
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