US Postal Service Discontinuing Saturday Mail Delivery

Hugh Pickens writes "The Postal Service has been losing billions of dollars each year as Americans increasingly rely on online communications that drive down mail volumes. Now, Reuters reports that the Postal Service plans to drop Saturday delivery of first-class mail by August, saving $2 billion per year. 'The Postal Service is advancing an important new approach to delivery that reflects the strong growth of our package business and responds to the financial realities resulting from America's changing mailing habits,' says Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe. But the Postal Service is already facing some pushback for moving forward with delivery schedule changes. 'Today's announcement by Postmaster General Donahoe to eliminate six-day delivery is yet another death knell for the quality service provided by the U.S. Postal Service,' says Jeanette Dwyer, president of the National Rural Letter Carriers' Association. 'To erode this service will undermine the Postal Service's core mission and is completely unacceptable.' Package deliveries will continue under the new plan and were a bright spot in a bleak 2012 fiscal year, with package revenue rising 8.7 percent during the year. Donahoe says the changes would allow the Postal Service to continue benefiting from rising package deliveries as Americans order more products from sites such as eBay Inc and Amazon.com Inc."

Comments

Who could have guessed?

[concealment]

Imagine that: unions, affirmative action and compliance with well-intentioned government programs do make you anti-competitive after all.

Gosh.

Re:Who could have guessed?

[LoyalOpposition]

The USPS is the most efficient system for moving things from one place to the other on the planet. Seriously. Its private competitors cost far more to move the same amount of stuff in a similar amount of time, and its international counterparts don't come close to dealing with the kinds of requirements the USPS has to deal with. Their systems and procedures are designed so that practically anybody can get hired, follow the manual, and do the job correctly, and are also capable of working under a wide variety of conditions ranging from tiny towns in the middle of Alaska to lower Manhattan.

It's not that they aren't competitive.

Wow! If they're that good, then it makes me wonder why they have to have a government-granted monopoly on letters.

~Loyal

Re:It doesn't help...

[Anonymous Coward]

Ask Congress to grant you a legal monopoly (lie down with dogs), have Congress mess up your business (get up with fleas).

They have no sympathy from me.

Not good enough...

[tetrahedrassface]

The USPS sucks. To say this Congresses fault for making them *gasp* fund the posh retirement funds is laughable. If their retirement funds are that difficult to fund, perhaps they need take on the unions that saddled them with these packages. I hope the fuckers go under. :) *flame away libtards*

HEIL HITLER

[Dainsanefh]

This is not a Christan country. This is a Zionist country. The government is controlled by Zionist. Usury is their game, their lifeblood.

The Zionist controlled Federal Reserve System would not let the Postal Savings System revive again. Period.

Re:Man, oh man!

[smittyoneeach]

Hey, hey, hey: it's important that we relive the 1930s, so that we appreciate the Depressing fullness of FDR's Greatness.