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US Postal Service To Make Sunday Deliveries For Amazon
guttentag writes "The New York Times is reporting The USPS has struck a deal to deliver Amazon's packages on Sundays — a first for both. The Postal Service, which lost nearly $16 billion last year, often loses money on first-class mail delivery, but package delivery is profitable. The Postal Service said it expected to make more such deals with other merchants, seeking a larger role in the $186 billion e-commerce market. For this holiday shopping season, Sunday delivery of Amazon products will be limited to the Los Angeles and New York metropolitan areas. In 2014 it is expected to expand to other cities including Dallas, Houston, New Orleans and Phoenix."
http://www.thomhartmann.com/blog/2012/08/us-postal-services-forced-financial-crisis
In 2006 – Republicans in Congress passed a poison pill piece of legislation forcing the Post Office to pre-fund retiree health benefits 75 years out into the future – basically funding benefits for future employees who aren’t even born yet. The Postal Service has to do this by giving the Treasury $5.5 billion every single year. That’s a requirement that no business, or any government agency has ever had to comply with. And it’s the reason why the Post Office is going bankrupt today and looking into closing down post offices, laying off workers, and cutting down delivery service.
Across the Western world, it has been the Right's strategy to privatise popular public services by first deliberately ruining them. Then public perception changes toward, "Oh wow you're right state ownership doesn't work!"
Occasionally, this comes at a cost to human life, such as Thatcher's deliberate underinvestment in the railways, followed by Major's spinning off of Railtrack without any clear identification as to who is responsible for maintenance. But usually it's just a huge fucking waste of money, and the privatised industry ends up enjoying multiple subsidies and regulatory capture.
This, of course, it pretty much the way it ought to be, at least for current employees: Retirement benefits fully funded, instead of vague promises.
Of course, since this money is paid to the government, instead of being put in an independent fund, the government will just steal it and replace it with IOUs
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
They are losing $16 billion a year because they pay out $5.5 billion a year for future pensions?
Bad math is bad math. If they didn't fund pensions at all, I guess you should expect future tax payers to just pay that, they are STILL behind $10.5 billion a year. Is that a success for your?
Also note, this bill was passed with STRONG bipartisan support as a way to show private business that pensions should be fully funded and how to do it. Revisionist history is revisionist history.
Just remove legislation protecting the USPS, together will any subsidies.
You mean remove the Constitution?
Despite your glib implication that subsidies are not needed, mail remains a vital service and it is important that it be available to everyone, even if this requires subsidies. There is no one else who realistically can replace the USPS including UPS and FedEx. This remains true despite falling mail volumes. Just because the postal service often seems to be mostly a paper spam delivery service doesn't mean it isn't also a vital service for communications. Remove subsidies right now and the USPS will collapse and yes that IS a Bad Thing (tm). While the USPS will need to adapt to modern times, the role it serves is a critical one and that isn't going to change.
And for those of you who remember fondly the good old days - The Post Office used to be open and deliver on Christmas day.
They also used to deliver multiple times a day. So what? We don't need that now. Times change.
Originally, the USPS was a government service, subsidized where necessary. It wasn't designed to operate as a private business or to make money. It was OK if it lost money because it was an overall boon to the economy. It worked fine that way for 200 years before it was privatized.
Now it's expected to operate as a private business and turn a profit in the existence of a competive marketplace while bound by rules and financial burdens its competitors do not have to bear. FedEx and UPS do not have to deliver anywhere they don't want to, to deliver on any days they don't want to; they have unregulated rates, don't subsidize anything and don't have to pre-fund retirement benefits.
It's a recipe for destruction. It might be saved by completely removing all regulations OR by giving it real subsidies in exchange for the regulations it bears that its competitors do not. It can't go on the way it is.
That's not so far off. If the USPS must pay $5 billion per year, then it shows continual losses, and the whole program can be cut. The Treasury then has a surplus of cash that's no longer earmarked for future employees, so it's a simple bit of labeling magic to release it into general funds.
That means that whatever party does eventually kill the USPS gets to claim responsibility for a few tens of billions of dollars additional revenue for the Treasury. With the right spin, the public at large will be aghast at how the irresponsible other party could have let the Postal Service survive so long when it was so obviously financially beneficial to shut it down.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
Forcing people to compete by breaking them up is even more sadistic than simply making it hard for them to cooperate. When will this religion end?
How about removing the ridiculous pension requirements that congress placed on them, then they would be profitable.
Well, while it was signed by a republican president and sponsored by a republican, it was cosponsored by 2 dems and a republican. It also passed house with a voice vote, and the senate with a unanimous vote.
This was a completely bipartisan bill that our whole government went in on.
Even the postal unions were for this (Why I have no idea).
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let's also remember the current post office is protected from many searches by the government, private entities are not. That is also a driving force here.
The Democrats strongly supported it. He is pretending that didn't happen. They also never tried to repeal it when they had the chance.
He is attempting to deceive you and hopes you won't go around asking questions.
Delivering packages every day = good. Only stop at the the places you need to.
Delivering letters and junk mail to every single mailbox on Saturday = bad. No extra revenue, and those letters can wait until Monday.
Please stop repeating this lie, granted it is repeated enough on alot of hate sites. For you it was probably a mistake since you did not know the truth.
Congress want to protect the taxpayer from having to take over the duties that the USPS said they would do,back in the 70s, the postmaster general and the postal unions want to make the taxpayers pay for their poor management and keep things as they are.
The postal accountability law,2006, requires the USPS to actually do some proper financial management and dropping it would not make them competitive again; even ignore the money they owe for this they would of lost money for the last couple of years. Without the money set aside they would not be able the meet the obligations they agreed to back in the 1970s and the people who retiring now would not have the monies that they are suppose to get. Privatization would solve nothing of this since the obligations would follow the person who purchased the company.
BTW the 75 years is number of years that is for ACCOUNTING purposes they have to figure future liabilities. It is NOT how long they have to fund benefits. That 75 years of accounting is followed by the DoD, social security, department of Housing, etc.
The too big to fail mentality was invented by the government and corporations.
No, "Too Big to Fail" is a natural consequence of the fact that not all aspects of business are self-regulating, as illustrated by the old adage that "Nothing Succeeds Like Success". In engineering terms, that's a positive feedback loop whose ultimate termination is extinction for the losers and monopoly for the winners.
In real life, actual mileage may vary. Capital-intensive businesses tend to be more likely to go that route because cost per unit tends to decrease the more units you buy. And because the entire reason for having a capital-based business is because other forms of business organization lack the resources needed to establish themselves and grow. Nor is it a "pure" model across the board. Even with the dominance of large pizza chains, mom-and-pop shops remain popular, but you're not going to find many steel refineries or chip foundries in that state.
Of course, once you reach a certain size, you can afford to start buying political favors, but the options available when you have lots of money to throw around expand in many different directions. That's just one of them.
"Too Big to Fail" isn't just a slogan. It's an acknowledgement that if you do fail, you'll cause major damage to the rest of the world in the process of collapsing. You will, in fact, have leveraged the cost of your own failure to the point where the collateral damage greatly exceeds the damage you yourself will receive and that therefore you have a gun to the figurative head of the economy.
The best way to ensure that Too Big To Fail doesn't occur is to put a choke on the positive feedback loop. Once a business begins to get so large that its likely to reach that point, limits should kick in. That is, in fact, what anti-trust laws were designed for.
In recent decades, though, we've been bombarded pretty much continuously with the mantras that Government Control is Always Bad and Unfettered Markets are Always Good. We de-fanged the laws that had been created as a result of the Great Depression, we did little or nothing to regulate monopolies (see, for example, Microsoft), and have even seen broken monopolies such as AT&T slowly rebuild themselves from their erstwhile breakup components like an old horror movie villain coming back for a sequel.
Then, to add icing to the cake, we've encouraged the get-rich-quick culture that says it's better to buy and sell and plunder and loot other businesses than to invest in one's own business.
It makes sense because it's part of basic infrastructure, that enables other services and businesses to function more efficiently.
You don't need to pull profits from basic infrastructure, if you can instead collect taxes from companies attracted by superior infrastructure that enables them to do business much more efficiently, and often do business where it would be otherwise impossible to do. It's called "synergy" - infrastructure enables more business, and pays for itself with taxes collected from them.
Because it actually forces the pensions to be funded - it's obvious why the union would like it.
Look at the cities going bankrupt in California, as an example. It's unfunded pension liabilities that are dragging them down. The USPS is being forced to actually make good on their promises, otherwise we'll have to bail out their pension fund in the future. The gripe (somewhat legit) is that they're being singled out for this treatment while every other government agency with promises that are going to be broken aren't given this treatment.
Do you have ESP?
The last mile is cut in many instances with the USPS. I have lived in many rural places where if i wanted to recieve mail, i had to purchase a p.o. box. They wouldn't even deliver packages to the door and you had to show up to sign for them durring bankers hours. And yes, fed ex would come right to the door too.
This isn't unusual in the least. There are areas more rural then the suburbs. Cost cutting at the post office has taken the last mile from many places. Perhaps this would be different if big businesses didn't get steep discounts for first class mail. But the facts are, we as citizens pay more than double what large companies pay and i doubt a private postal service would be able to do that if they were losing money on it.
Read the summary? loses money on first-class mail delivery, but package delivery is profitable. Saturday MAIL delivery loses them money. While Sunday PACKAGE delivery is profitable.
All you need to incentivize spending money wisely is privatization; if you waste money you suffer consequences (get fired),
I'm not saying the other guy is right, but you've never held a real corporate job have you? Waste is rampant in all major companies and the executives responsible for it don't get fired (they may leave for "family reasons", but they take their bonuses and parachutes with them).
The problem with Michael's argument is that just because a company is in the red doesn't automatically stop waste. In fact in some cases it makes it worse as all the little fiefdoms within continue to fight for their piece regardless of how it impacts the rest of the company or if they really need it.
Well, while it was signed by a republican president and sponsored by a republican, it was cosponsored by 2 dems and a republican. It also passed house with a voice vote, and the senate with a unanimous vote.
That doesn't mean as much as you think it does. Perhaps to the surprise of nobody, our lawmakers rarely read the full text of the bill they vote on, instead trusting their underlings to summarize it. Sometimes hundred page documents get about as much space as a Twitter post in the mindspace of these guys before they vote on it. And you might have noticed... the names are less and less related to the thing they're about with every new session. At this point, I fully expect to see a Strengthing America's Freedom Act authorizing labor camps and bringing back debtor's prisons in the not too distant future. :/
So there is that. And the argument can be made that whether it was the Republicans or the Democrats... the result rather speaks for itself. Also, questionable what difference there really is between the two parties... since right now over 93% of candidates who win elections are better financed than their opponent. It's clear there really is only one political party: The Richy McRich Club. What colors you wanna wear they leave up to you, but ultimately, both parties are just part of one organization that's only really distinct in the minds of the poor and the uneducated.
But the OP is right: It was fine before it was shot in the head by our government.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
Fuck you. Reliable mail service to 99% of addresses is the mark of an advanced Republic. I dont care how much money it loses, its a vital piece of infrastructure.
Good-bye
Mr. Anonymous? I think you need to stop swearing, calm down, and look at a very important question that you (accidentally) raised.
What IS basic infrastructure?
Roads. Sewers. Electricity. Water delivery. Education. Hopefully decent health care. Working law systems. And yes, even something as basic as package delivery. Internet?
See, I run a business. I NEED those things for my business to function, but I'm too small to buy them for everyone, let alone to buy them for myself. I need roads so my workers can get to work. I need roads so I can ship things. I need electricity or my machines can't run. I need water delivery and good sewers so all my customers aren't dying of dysentary. I need basic education so there is a half assedly educated workforce available for me to hire. I really do need decent health care so _I_ don't have to provide it for my workers (god what a headache). I need basic law systems so I can have legal protections or sue someone who tries to take unlawful actions against my business (or me). Package delivery? Yeah, I depend on that. I build widgets. I NEED parts delivered. My business wouldn't exist without the postal service.
Man do I wish internet was a basic infrastructure....
Anyway, if these were provided by private companies, they would be a fucking mess. Just imagine private roads. Multiple roads in parallel, starting, stopping, the legal hassles of right of way, the tolls, fees, the collusion, the even larger tolls and fees... No. It's a nightmare!
So, businesses and individuals NEED the government to create this basic infrastructure. What the poster is saying is even that businesses are attracted to countries that HAVE this infrastructure. I sure wouldn't want to run my business in Somalia, that's for damn sure. Maybe the market is there, but the act of running my business would be far harder due to the lack of infrastructure. Ew. No Thanks.
In short, you benefit so much, and you take it all for granted. That you DO take it for granted is a sign of how WELL that government provided basic infrastructure works. You benefit FAR beyond what taxes you put in because it's a collective effort.
Also, you ignorant twit.... You want to whine about government waste? Sure. Go ahead. But be civil about it. The OP raised a good point, an intelligent point, and you were so busy being angry that you missed it. Calm down and LISTEN next time.
Also, we all pay taxes. Seriously, quit whining.
My mailbox is filled with junk mail every day. In fact, I bet I get 3-4X as much junk mail as I do legitimate mail. I probably get 1-2 newspaper-like ads every week from grocers that I've probably never opened.I bet the USPS would start making money if they started charging these guys closer to regular rates. Well, assuming they can't get the pension pre-funding fixed in Congress.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
"It actually makes sense for an entity like the postal service to be losing money."
Socialism is truly a mental disorder. Do you realize what you just said? Do you have to be reminded to breathe?
All you need to incentivize spending money wisely is privatization; if you waste money you suffer consequences (get fired),
The state is the only organization where you would find people saying 'it is better to waste money', because the money they waste is not theirs, and the supply is unlimited - they can always tax more or print more.
But you are advocating pissing away MY MONEY. I just wish you would have the balls to tell that to me to my face. But we all know you are nothing but a pathetic lying statist thief and a coward.
God I fucking hate socialists.
The post office is self-funded. It has not received taxpayer funding for a long time.
So, they're not pissing away "your" money.
Besides, the only reason they are officially losing money is because they were forced via an act of congress to pre-fund a retirement that is extremely onerous and far beyond what any private company would have to do. This was done so that the republicans can say "hey, look, the USPS isn't working! Let's privatise it!".
Sorry to burden you with facts, it looked like you had a good head of steam up there for your frothing libertarian rant.
Um, no. There is no other corporate or government entity in this country that is required to meet the standards applied to the USPS under that law, and the 75 years is indeed a hard funding benefit - they've got a $5b/year over 10 years requirement.
I believe if you look at the accounting, absent the pre-payment plan the USPS actually made money last year.
Let us live so that when we come to die, even the undertaker will be sorry -- Mark Twain
I think the question of whether or not something should be government-run (or at least involved) vs free market is: Are we, as a society, okay if some people don't get this service?
If the answer to that is 'yes', then free market is probably the way to go.
But if the answer to that is 'no', then free market won't work -- free market requires the voluntary participation of buyers AND sellers.
Don't care if some people don't have health care or education because they can't afford it? Free market is the way to go.
Think health care & education are important for a civilized, well-functioning society? Probably need to have government involvement then -- which is not to say our current systems are perfect (far from it!) but "free market" is not the solitary answer.
The USPS doesn't pay property tax, sales tax, or federal income tax. They also get special loans directly from the Treasury. That's all taxpayer funding.
Then there are the special laws the protect the USPS, like the monopoly on letter carrying and the their immunity from parking tickets. If you don't count those laws as "funding" they at least qualify as government support.