The U.S.P.S. Is A Failure!....Not Really!!

I have this deeply Conservative Republican friend, and once in a while, we like to have discussions/arguments about policies, politics, the state of our country, etc. So this last “discussion” we had, ended up being about the US Post Office.

As you might know, the US Post Office had been in the news again last week because of their announcement of them cutting their Saturday mail delivery services. And because of that, my friend points out how the government cannot run anything properly, AND because of this, we NEED to privatize! Especially the Post Office because it has become such a burden on tax payers.



I agree with my friend that there are some things that the government cannot run, but not because of incompetence. There are certain things that they cannot run (or more accurately mishandle) for other reasons that I will come back to in a little bit…

My friend then stated that he doesn’t want his tax dollars going to a failed institution. I then had to ask, “So how much money from the National Budget do you think gets allocated to the USPS?” “I’m not sure”, my friend said, “but I know it definitely contributes to our National Deficit.” And sadly, this is the same answer I see on TV as well, when our news media asks ordinary citizens why they think the USPS is having financial issues and leaving it at that, making those people figure it out for themselves, RATHER than informing the public on what the real problems the USPS are facing.

Case in point, here is a news piece from ABC News with Dianne Sawyer.

Informative video right? Well, not so much. There is a lot of information that was left out and the main narrative driven was that the internet and email is the cause of the Post Office’s loss of income. This is not entirely accurate at all! I’m going to touch upon what was left out of the ABC News story in a minute.

First off, it is important to note, and to give my friend the answer on how much of our tax dollars the US Postal Service siphons off to fund their operations, the number is actually ZERO Dollars. The USPS and its pension program does not take one cent from tax payer money and is completely funded by stamps.

So back to the point driven by ABC News that email and the internet has brought a decline in business at the Post Office. Not true. It is true that the average resident/person sends out less letters due to email, but the other end of that, is businesses. They still use, if not have increased their use and reliance of the US Post office to send out their mail or services to their customers. For example, online companies such as eBay, Amazon, Netflix, and online drug companies has brought welcomed business to the Post Office.  And it is worth noting that last year, it has been recorded that 1.6 billion people have visited a brick and mortar Post Office.

Now it is also true that the US Post office is currently  going through some major deficits, but up until 2006, the US Post Office ran efficiently with no budget shortfall whatsoever. So what happened? Well, in 2006, in a Lame Duck Session and on a voice vote, the Republicans in Congress passed the “Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act (PAEA) – H.R. 6407” into law. This law, which is designed to destroy one of our most successful institutions in history, is the major crux of why the US Post Office is going through its financial and operational difficulties.

Just one of the most egregious parts of the PAEA to point out, is that Congress mandates the US Post Office to fully fund its pension program on a 75 year horizon. That is about $55 Billion dollars ($5,500,000,000 annually) that must be paid off within one decade!

If you think about it, the USPS is required to fund pensions for people who are not yet even born, and who might not even end up working for the Post Office at all! This right here is a single burden that no other public or private business for that matter, has placed on them. This alone accounts for more than 70% of their losses as stated by the US Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe. And for some reason or another, ABC News and most other News media outlets left this part out of their coverage even though they were present and used video of the US Postmaster’s press release.

Speaking of the US Postmaster’s press release, here is the video in its entirety, where Patrick Donahoe speaks about the US Post Office’s plans eliminate Saturday services to help reduce cost. Pay attention to the parts our News Media left out.

 

It is interesting though, that in a twist to this story, the USPS is so tightly controlled by Congress, they do not have the Constitutional or Statutory authority to make these changes. They can’t even raise the price of their stamps in order to maintain a balanced operating budget without Congressional approval. (Another factor why the USPS isn’t going to increase stamp prices, btw.)

So why is the Postmaster doing this? Well, it is speculated that by making these changes, the USPS is trying to force Congress to take them to court. This will then hopefully shine a light on the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act and force the American people to question why our government is imposing such restrictions on the Post Office which no other business entity has. And so far, it seems to be working with certain members of Congress outraged at this move by the Postmaster General.

Another question to ask is, why would our own Congress do this to annihilate the United States Post Office?  Unfortunately that question is easily answered when you look at campaign finance and lobbying efforts by private corporations like FedEx and UPS who both have donated well over $19 million to congress since 2006. “It’s the money Lebowski!”

Unfortunately you can say yes, there is an argument that the US Post Office is in danger of going down in ruins. But it is not for the reasons our News Media and corporate owned Congress IS and IS NOT telling us. It looks like it’s up to us to find the facts for ourselves so we don’t get fleeced by certain private interests who want to make a quick profit for themselves while we suffer the consequences. You know the motto, “Privatize the gains, socialize the losses.”

I hope this got your blood boiling at least a little bit. If not, here is Ed Shultz from MSNBC’s “The Ed Show”

 And Sam Seder of “The Majority Report”.

They are some of the few News commentators who hit the points of this issue on the head. They should get your heart pumping!

Oh, and how did the discussion with my friend end? I lost of course, because I'm a dirty Marxist, Communistic, Maoist, Socializing, filthy Hippy Liberal! :-)

LINKS:

United States Postal Service
U.S. Postal Regulatory Commission
The History of the U.S.P.S.
Wikipedia: The US Post Office
H.R. 6407 (109th): Postal Accountability & Enhancement Act
Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act: Overview and Issues for Congress
OpenSecrets.org: FedEx
OpenSecrets.org: United Parcel Service
WOLF-PAC: Get Money Out of Politics!