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Trump Personally Pushed Postmaster General To Double Rates on Amazon, Other Firms: Report (washingtonpost.com)
President Trump personally urged the leader of the U.S. Postal Service to double the rates the agency charges Amazon and other firms for delivery packages in several private conversations in 2017 and 2018, The Washington Post reported Friday (alternative source). From the report: Postmaster General Megan Brennan has so far resisted Trump's demand, explaining in multiple conversations occurring this year and last that these arrangements are bound by contracts and must be reviewed by a regulatory commission, the three people said. She has told the president that the Amazon relationship is beneficial for the Postal Service and gave him a set of slides that showed the variety of companies, in addition to Amazon, that also partner for deliveries.
Despite these presentations, Trump has continued to level criticism at Amazon. And last month, his critiques culminated in the signing of an executive order mandating a government review of the financially strapped Postal Service that could lead to major changes in the way it charges Amazon and others for package delivery. Few U.S. companies have drawn Trump's ire as much as Amazon, which has rapidly grown to be the second-largest U.S. company in terms of market capitalization. For more than three years, Trump has fumed publicly and privately about the giant commerce and services company and its founder Jeffrey P. Bezos, who is also the owner of The Washington Post.
Despite these presentations, Trump has continued to level criticism at Amazon. And last month, his critiques culminated in the signing of an executive order mandating a government review of the financially strapped Postal Service that could lead to major changes in the way it charges Amazon and others for package delivery. Few U.S. companies have drawn Trump's ire as much as Amazon, which has rapidly grown to be the second-largest U.S. company in terms of market capitalization. For more than three years, Trump has fumed publicly and privately about the giant commerce and services company and its founder Jeffrey P. Bezos, who is also the owner of The Washington Post.
Won't that just push Amazon to set up their own private courier services? Not that I feel sympathy for either side of this fight.
Better watch your mouths' tech billionaires! Support your President or face his wrath! #MAGA!
Sounds like good business to me. How is this bad for Trump? Looks like he stopped the USPS from being fleeced if the market is paying the new prices rather than jumping to competitors.
I am sorry the company CEO is hurting the Presidents fragile Ego. But shouldn't he be Mr. Business man? Who looks at the big picture and works to make profitable deals no matter what your personal feelings are to the other person? Just as long as Amazon and like companies are not being charged at a loss at such bulk rates this is money to the USPS system, that isn't going to its competitors of FedEx and UPS. Doubling the Rates will not hurt Amazon that much, It will just hurt the USPS because Amazon will just move to the next cheapest shipping method.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
He'll put his personal touch into 6x9 feet of the luxurious Trump Wing at Leavenworth Downs. Treason is not too strong a word.
You'd think that as a self-professed "businessman", Trump would understand how demand curves work -- if you double the price of a product, demand decreases, if other suppliers (UPS, Fedex, Ontrac, Amazon's own service, etc) can deliver for less, then the postoffice loses out on income for a business that costs very little to provide when they are already sending workers out to every address.
Though I'd be happy to see Amazon stop using the USPS -- they are the least reliable of all of the other services Amazon uses, packages sometimes show up days after they were marked "delivered", or don't show up at all. I fairly often get packages meant for neighbors, I assume this is the source of the delayed packages.
Fedex and UPS are the best, packages show up on time. Amazon's own delivery service has been ok, but seem to have a high number of rescheduled deliveries when they've run out of time to deliver. Maybe I'm on the end of the route.
The shipping for mega corps SHOULD be run at a loss and the loss be paid for with tax dollars!
If you don't think that you are a commie!
Congrats, USA. You have elected a petulant child to run the executive branch.
This is a country, with LAWS and REGULATIONS.
We're soooo going to have fun suing your ass for assigning criminals as heads of the EPA and FCC, I'm actually surprised you didn't assign a known pedophile as the head of the Dept. of Education as you seem intent on handing the reigns for every office intended to protect and benefit something to the person least qualified to run it and most intent on destroying it.
What a fucktard.
Dunno if Amazon is being wronged here or not. Quite possibly they are.
I must say though that it's heartening to see Democrats be so fond of multi-bazillionaire captains of industry also owning major media outlets. A tad unexpected, but heartening.
She has told the president that the Amazon relationship is beneficial for the Postal Service and gave him a set of slides that showed the variety of companies, in addition to Amazon, that also partner for deliveries.
Look, if the guy wanted your opinion, he'd ask for it. He's TELLING you to raise the rates on Amazon.
It's like explaining to a toddler that eating more ice cream is going to make his tummy hurt. Either give in to his terrible idea or prepare for a big, ugly tantrum.
Donald is going to prison, the question is how deep is Pence's dick in the dirty business of Trump's backside deals?
The USPS is bringing in tons of money through their deals with companies like Amazon. They're not somehow getting screwed. Like in a lot of cases, if you're going to buy a large amount of a product or service, you can generally negotiate to get it at a lower bulk rate. That's not somehow unusual.
It's essentially guaranteed business for USPS. If they double the rate, I'm sure FedEx, UPS, etc., will be quite happy to carry Amazon's packages instead, and the USPS will wind up being the one that loses.
But, what's that matter when you've got an ego to feed? This never was about postal rates. This is about Trump not liking Jeff Bezos, because the Washington Post has the gall to call people's attention to it when Trump says something stupid.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
You act like they get special treatment. No, they pay the same price other companies pay. They negotiate it and lock it into a contract.
So please tell us, what subsidies are amazon using?
Now that Amazon leverages USPS more heavily, my shipments seldom arrive on time and often the packages look like they have been through Thunderdome.
This is NOT news.
Wake me up when he does something not boneheaded.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
Exactly how insane are you? Amazon have a net profit margin of 3.19% that is far far from "the most profitable company on the earth". E.g Microsoft have 23.57%
They're not subsidizing Amazon. They were turning a mild profit until they were forced to pre-pay pensions by law instead of acting like any other government or private entity.
Did you miss the part where the postmaster general said that these arrangements are beneficial to the post office?
Is there any data to back up your claim that they're losing money on the deal?
I am sorry the company CEO is hurting the Presidents fragile Ego. But shouldn't he be Mr. Business man? Who looks at the big picture and works to make profitable deals no matter what your personal feelings are to the other person?
Uh, that would be competing on the merits. That is not going to make America great again. Not when pitted against the likes of China. We did not elect a tantrum-throwing child in order to make rational decisions.
The whole issue here is that the USPS is subsidizing Amazon delivery, by charging rates lower than what it actually costs to ship things. Other mail fees are subsidizing Amazon, how is that right???
That is a lie.
USPS financial report
"You want to know how to help your kids? Leave them the fuck alone." -George Carlin
This story about the U.S. Postal Service, Amazon/Jeff Bezos, and Donald Trump, is case-in-point as to why he never was Presidential material, why he is not a good President now, and why he never will be a good President, ever: Donald Trump is incapable of de-coupling his ego from his personality when it comes to his duty as President of the United States. The lies, the staffing choices based on personal loyalty and not personal integrity and aptitude, the grandstanding (attention whoring, basically), the temper-tantrums when he doesn't get his way, and decision-making based on personal grudges and personal vendettas (as is the case here specifically) are all anyone with two eyes and a functioning brain need to see that he is not now and won't ever be someone who should have been allowed to be elected in the first place. Never mind that he may well be at least as crooked as Tricky Dick or not (we may never really know, but boy oh boy does it look likely), or that he's flat-out incompetent politically (vis-a-vis Israel/Jerusalem), what we've seen since January 2017 is so far as I and so many others are concerned more than enough evidence that Donald J. Trump as POTUS was one of the worst electoral mistakes in the history of the United States, one that this country will spend decades living down with the rest of the world.
Trump is a fucking crybaby just be can the Washington Post justifiably criticizes him. Maybe he did the free shipping he expected....meanwhile Rome burns
Don't leave all that money on the table! Obama forced USPS to give a sweet deal to Amazon just because Bezos is a democrat. Undo the bad deal!!!
They were forced to make pension payments:
1. Because they were chronically under-funding their pension system to balance the books, forcing the federal government to step in and cover their losses
2. In a manner that ALL public and private agencies should handle their pensions - figure out how much they are going to have to pay out over the next 50-70 years, and put away enough money to cover it
The USPS has publish information multiple times debunking this statement.
The primary reason that the USPS makes a profit on Amazon even though the indivitual package price is very low is that Amazon fills the shipment.
An analogy would be a standby ticket. They need to charge passengers $200 for the flight but there are often empty seats so charging someone $50 for those IS profitable because those were unsold tickets and the new passenger costs only a little bit extra.
The USPS has obligations for certain delivery times mandated by congress, so they have a ton of empty space on the airplane or freight truck. Unlike the airlines that schedule fewer flights when a route is slow, the USPS still has to drive it every single day.
USPS items get loaded first, then other shippers like Amazon. If the truck fills, Amazon waits for the next truck but that's such a rare occurrence that it isn't a concern for Amazon.
Yea, it's called capitalism moron. Operates just like every other American business. Amazon just happens to be successful, unlike Trumper Dumpie.
.... You clearly don't have a head for finances. I suggest you check shipping rates for local delivery as that's basically what the PO is doing, and always has been doing. They're getting more light parcels to deliver on their normal routes with only a moderate extra burden, but profit is far higher. Amazon uses DHL, Fedex, and UPS to deliver to the PO with their big expensive cargo liners, the post office is the last leg in delivery and they don't rush, they do it on their own normal schedule. DHL and the like however are pressured to deliver it early enough so that it will get to you on a normal PO route...
The amazing strong president should always personal to intervene in market when biased liberal companies like amazon get too out of hand.
The Postal Service's so-called money problems are nothing but a political game. They're doing just fine.
You are a libtard
At what point will you admit that neither of them are going to jail? Before or after I put my penis in your butt?
There should be a smear job on Trump. EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. Glad WAPO is doing their patriotic duty.
Yes, it's a complaint - no one else needs to pre-fund pension plans. Your second sentence about them going broke doesn't make sense.
...then he should get the states to increase their diesel taxes and weight-mile taxes on trucks. But this would harm the oil industry which pays big money to politicians and so it will never happen.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
They don't provide the same quality of service as the other carriers though, they are cheaper and thats great and on the volume that Amazon needs they are probably a good option (hence the reason Amazon uses them) but if they cost as much as Fedex, but loose more packages then nobody is ever going to use them.
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
It's fitting that the story comes from the Washington Post since this has nothing to do with Amazon and EVERYTHING to do with the smear job WAPO has been doing to Trump.
So you are claiming that a story about how Trump is pushing the Postmaster General to significantly increase the rates it charges Amazon... has nothing to do with Amazon? Are you saying Trump did not, in fact, press for Amazon's postal rates to increase? Because the Postmaster General has specifically and rather publicly stated why she cannot do that - which would be an odd and random thing for her to say if Trump hadn't asked for it.
How about a similar story from Fox News? Is this one a smear job too? Did Bezos buy Fox News? http://www.foxnews.com/politic...
#DeleteChrome
So how has Amazon hurt trump in teh past? I have heard mention that it hurts him by de-valuing brick-and-mortar retail space that he is heavily invested in.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
So:
- Trump says the Post Office is giving Amazon (owned by Jeff Bezos) a couple bucks of subsidies per package and orders the Post Office to readjust their special deal.
- The Washington Post (owned by Jeff Bezos) runs an article flaming Trump and making several claims - such as that the deal is good for the Post Office, Trump's underlings are fighting back, yadda yadda yadda.
I trust nobody will be surprised if I take the Post article's claims with a grain (or a 50-pound block) of salt at this point, at least until I see an analysis of Amazon's deal from something other than a newspaper owned byAmazon's founder and bought with part of the billions of dollars he made off Amazon.
Maybe it IS a good deal for the post office. But let's see that from someone without skin in the game.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
The Valley has received enough special treatment. About time.
Bills of attainder are forbidden by the US Constitution. Federal regulations have the force of law, so no Donny, you can't fuck around with Amazon's contract with the USPS.
Really, I understand he's not a lawyer, but he took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, a document with which he is manifestly completely unfamiliar. I think there's a case to be made that he can be forced to at least read it once. While wearing his glasses that he refuses to wear in public, which is why he appears to be illiterate in public settings.
The funny thing is : Trump is going to prison. Republicans are going to put him there. And there's nothing you can do about it.
Now, let me allow you to continue whining and threatening violence at me, calling me a libtard or whatever you like despite not knowing me or how I vote.
This is still a free country, despite the occasional nazi going down in flames due to their own unsupportable actions. God Bless.
The whole issue here is that the USPS is subsidizing Amazon delivery, by charging rates lower than what it actually costs to ship things.
Not true. The USPS is not charging Amazon rates less than what it costs to ship.
The USPS already goes to every address in the USA every day by law, so adding Amazon's pre-sorted, palleted, and bar-coded packages is a small incremental cost. This is not true for UPS and FedEx, so their per-package costs are higher.
The formula used by USPS to determine package shipping rates is set by Congress, and the USPS is legally forbidden to charge less than its actual costs. The reason for that law is Congress does not want USPS to use the advantages it has to put UPS and Fed Ex out of business.
The people who claim that USPS is shipping below cost, or should be forced to charge more are lobbyists/liars for FedEx and UPS. USPS cannot make political donations.
God forbid the man be right about something, even if it is motivated entirely by petty spite. The fact that the partnership is good for the USPS isn't equivalent to it being good for commerce in general. Amazon is too fucking big. It's dangerous.
I see things like this and imagine if he was able to actually just do what he wants, unencumbered by the little checks and balances we have left.
From just purely the words out of his mouth I could see us nearing third world status in a decade or two if he was left to his own devices. And I say that with not a bit of hyperbole.
They are being forced to pre-fund pension plans FAR in advance of their obligation. That is singularly different than ANY other company or entity. It is literally starving them of resources. They can't adequately keep their facilities updated, clean, or expand services. The Post Office is one of the few things specifically mentioned in the Constitution as a service the Government is expected to provide.
If it were not for companies like Amazon and others, the Post Office would have gone bankrupt.
Welcome Amazon Shipping and Postal Company.
So:
- Trump says the Post Office is giving Amazon (owned by Jeff Bezos) a couple bucks of subsidies per package and orders the Post Office to readjust their special deal.
- The Washington Post (owned by Jeff Bezos) runs an article flaming Trump and making several claims - such as that the deal is good for the Post Office, Trump's underlings are fighting back, yadda yadda yadda.
I trust nobody will be surprised if I take the Post article's claims with a grain (or a 50-pound block) of salt at this point, at least until I see an analysis of Amazon's deal from something other than a newspaper owned byAmazon's founder and bought with part of the billions of dollars he made off Amazon.
Maybe it IS a good deal for the post office. But let's see that from someone without skin in the game.
I think it started with the Post reporting facts about Lyin' Donald and his campaign back in 2016, or earlier.
The alternative was Hillary.
You are dilusional
In the not too distant future, such tedious clunky relics as "laws" and "contracts" and "regulatory commissions" will be a thing of the past. The thugocracy will have won and the US will be the world's biggest banana republic. Everything will be done by presidential decree, the will of the president's family and ruling party.
Postmaster General Megan Brennan has so far resisted Trump's demand, explaining in multiple conversations occurring this year and last that these arrangements are bound by contracts and must be reviewed by a regulatory commission, the three people said.
Yet another example of Trump encouraging illegal activities.
Maybe it IS a good deal for the post office. But let's see that from someone without skin in the game.
You mean like the Post Master General?
They got around this with Nixon by naming him an indicted coconspirator...
So you will take the post office claims that they are abiding by the law that all deals must be profitable as dubious, and consider an almost pathological liar who uses FoxNews Channel as basically his cabinet and calls pretty much all news fake news that doesn't lick his boots?
There is absolutely no reason to think this is some 'bad deal' for the taxpayer aside from The Whiner in chief having a beef with Bezos because he owns the WP and they have the audacity to call out Trump on his never ending stream of bullshit.
You add that Trump has publicly exclaimed/bragged MANY times on how him/his companies avoiding taxes is just being a good businessman and things become very clear.
I mean, how about the Post Office themselves? https://about.usps.com/news/statements/080117.htm. The USPS has been pretty damn clear on this. https://gizmodo.com/former-postmaster-general-says-trump-is-completely-wron-1825025953
You should take the Post's claims with a grain of salt - not because Bezos owns them, but because any single source should be verified. But this has been, repeatedly.
--------------------- -me, Crusher of those who are Foolish (don't be foolish)
Let me help you out with a piece of advice: google is fucking easy to use.
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http://www.businessinsider.com...
http://fortune.com/2018/03/29/...
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
They wouldn't want to admit they presided over a lousy deal would they? I don't know that it is a lousy deal but people have all kinds of reasons why they would misrepresent something.
love is just extroverted narcissism
This is like watching a dog (a literal dog, a canine, such as a collie or a dachshund) try to instruct a formation of geese on the topics of acrobatic formation flying and the proper use of tail feathers. He knows nothing about what he's talking about, his own experience is of no help since a dog's tail functions entirely differently from those of birds, he doesn't have feathers, he can't fly, aerodynamics are entirely outside his experience and they don't speak the same language.
Only the dog would still have an easier time of it and be more effective in giving these instructions, even when the flock of geese that is the intended recipient of the instructions is miles away, high in the sky, and completely unable to hear the dog's instructions, (and moreover all the members are unaware of the dog's existence).
Donald Trump is plainly and painfully unaware of how any successful business operates, (though he does, I'll grant you, know how to capitalize on his own inevitable failures in business,) likely has no idea how the post office works, either in law or in practice, and so has no way of understanding how a unique business like the USPS functions, (inasmuch as it is not really a business, but rather a part of the federal government that unlike all the others, is obliged to pay its own way in the world, but has the handicap as it competes with private businesses that it can only function as Congress directs, through law and regulation).
Moreover, he has demonstrated complete ignorance of how an economy works, and is basically an empty, vaguely man-shaped shell inflated by the pressure of his own ego, with nothing to justify it. Then he asks people who are themselves completely unqualified to do things to do them, as if he WANTS the US government to fail, and it's hard to see how his goal in everything he does is anything OTHER than that; the unavoidable conclusion based on the totality of observations that can be made by someone not in government, viewing it all from without, is that he's secretly some species of anarchist, or nihilist, or both.
Sure, they could. But the target of trumpos rage is not based on the actual deal itself it's based off of (like usual) misconstrued/misrepresented facts. And as everyone really knows the WP...ya know the "AmazonWashingtonPost" as trump likes to call it.
There was some analysis piece done a while back that said the USPS *could/should be charging more* but that doesn't fall into line even close with the narrative Trump is (most likely parroting from fox news) spewing. Multibillion dollar deals are a tad more complex than 'they could be making more, therefore they are losing money' as Trump asserts: "the U.S. Post Office will lose $1.50 on average for each package it delivers for Amazon"
Anyway, the deal is secret but the numbers aren't. The deal has shown to be a boon for the USPS because all of their numbers were in a freefall beforehand. That is indisputable and directly attributable to the deal with Amazon.
They are required to pre-fund for employees 75 years out per the interpretation of the government on the law congress passed. This means prefunding retirement for employees that have not been born yet.
It's absurd and anyone that can't see that is a shill or a partisan troll.
No, you're still losing money. You're just losing less of it, and in this case it is Amazon that is paying less than others.
Is there any data to back up your claim that they're losing money on the deal?
Just look at the user name -- SuperKendall. No, of course he doesn't have any data. He never has data.
They only lose more packages because they handle way more packages. It's also why their service is worse.
Think of it this way. In 3 days, USPS handles as much mail pieces as FedEx in a year. UPS is bigger, so it takes USPS about 7 days to exceed UPS' amount. And not surprisingly, I haven't found many people with a high opinion of UPS, either.
The sheer scale of USPS is amazing
Pension plans are normallly invested, not pre-funded. It is fine to go and criticize the investments and bad money management if some details emerge, but pre-funding pensions is not typically demanded of many other goverment agencies. Because the post office manages to be efficient and self sufficient, it angers all the government-is-evil politicians.
If their services are explicitly defined in the constitution why would they need to expand them?
As I posted above: "Yup. Bonds at ~16% interest @600million. There's an absolutely zero chance that whole project wasn't about side deals and whatnot. There was never any way the casino was going to make enough to even cover the interest, roughly 8 million a month. "
USPS is mandated by Congress to budget for future retirements of employees who are not even born yet. Tough to be profitable with that mandate...Easy to target by anti-public-sector folks.
That is not the case. The law says they are to fund pensions with the assumption of people living to 75 years of age. Not 75 years out.
'If it were not for companies like Amazon and others, the Post Office would have gone bankrupt"
That's been the GOP plan all along. They'll use that to "prove" that private enterprise is always better, smarter and cost-effective, they'll find a way to screw the workers out of their pensions and amend the constitution to either get rid of the Post Office or to allow its functions to fulfilled by corporations entirely.
Another fact-free post from the Alt-Right. Anyone who uses the term "cuck" is a Nazi douche who takes it up the ass regularly, as evidenced by the mean string of shit that comes out every time you open your mouth.
Now go play in traffic, asshole cocksucker. You have corrupted vision, artificial fortitude, no plan, no compassion, no morals and your criminal in chief will be in jail soon enough.
"MUSPSGA! I'm going to double USPS package rates which will double profits! Obama never did that, believe me! Amazon is so unfair, using USPS, can you believe it? Packages! Most people don't know, it's supposed to be a Postal Service. Most people don't know that. Why is Amazon asking the Postal Service to deliver packages? They deliver letters, not packages, so unfair!
MUSPSGA!
Can I tell you about my election victory? Remember the map?"
It's my understanding that USPS has something called a "bulk discount rate", and Amazon simply utilizes this when using the postal service. Why should Amazon now be prohibited from doing so, or is the proposal to remove the bulk discount rate entirely?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
News for libtards. Stuff that matters to people who unironically think Stephen Colbert is funny.
You can earn a profit off of one transaction, while losing losing money on another.
It's fitting that the story comes from the Washington Post since this has nothing to do with Amazon and EVERYTHING to do with the smear job WAPO has been doing to Trump. Bezos owns WAPO so Trump blames Bezos for everything WAPO does. What amazes me is with all the ammunition Trump freely provides the press WAPO still finds ways to push the envelope on twisting the truth.
You're right, it has nothing to do with Amazon. Trump is punishing Amazon not because of Amazon, but because of the Washington Post.
To be clear. I don't think there's sufficient evidence of collusion, bribery, or obstruction of justice to justify impeachment at this point.
However, I think he is veeeery close with Amazon, and if he actually did order the Postmaster General to double Amazon's rates he's stepped into the realm of trying to economically harm a major business because the owner has a newpaper giving him critical coverage.
If that were to happen I'd say impeach him in a minute.
Not only is it a blatant violation of the 1st amendment but it shows he hasn't the foggiest interest in accepting the responsibilities of being President.
He was elected to lead the country, not own it.
I stole this Sig
follow the money. I'll wager you'll find FedEx & UPS bribes of some kind behind this.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Well, the thing about other pensions is that they stopped being given because they kept getting raided. What would happen is that they would under-invest them in stocks, come up with an "optimistic" rate of returns and oh no that sucks, turns out there isn't money for the pension we promised you, sorry. Blame the failed pension not the people who promised it to you. Private businesses mostly gave up on pensions, so now we just do that with Social Security instead because at least the government can print money.
As for Amazon, the WaPo is also owned by Bezos and has a stake in this. Whether or not they're getting their money's worth from Amazon's business is something I don't think a single person here has put forward a single cogent argument on in either direction. No, pointing out that the service was once profitable overall does almost nothing to show that Amazon's business with them was cash-positive, that's rather weak evidence. They could have had more profitable lines of business subsidizing the others, you'll have to dive deep into their financials and estimate how much things cost to make a real argument here. If anything, Amazon is like Wal-Mart and ruthless at cutting costs, so one would expect the margins to be thin enough that reasonable people might disagree based on their estimates of different costs.
This is still a free country, despite the occasional nazi going down in flames due to their own unsupportable actions. God Bless.
Hitler was a Progressive. Most of the Nazi platform reads like Progressive/DNC platform planks. The gas chambers Hitler gassed the Jews with were directly a result of Progressives like George Bernard Shaw.
https://youtu.be/WgpaKkrZex4
Progressives == Nazis
As a heavy user of Amazon, I really, really hope that a USPS rate hike convinces Amazon to stop using them. My package delivery has gotten much slower and less reliable since they started using USPS rather than UPS. I'd love to see them go back to using UPS and FedEx exclusively.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Your matching 401k (where your employer matches what you put into it) is a pre-funded pension. The full amount of the company's obligation leaves the company's control as soon as you've fulfilled the obligation (worked for a month). If the company goes bankrupt, it doesn't affect your 401k, unlike what nearly happened to GM. When they were in danger of going bankrupt, all their pensioners were in danger of losing their pension. Which would've ended up turning them into bottom-priority creditors who would likely only collect pennies per dollar they were owed. That can't happen with a wholly pre-funded pension where the pension is spun off into a separate entity.
The USPS pension pre-funding requirement was created to prevent the situation California is in. For decades, the state and local government underfunded pension obligations, instead relying on overly optimistic projections of future returns on fund investment to create the illusion that the pensions were adequately funded. As the decades of underfunding built up, the delta between the actual funding and the illusory projected funding grew more and more, until eventually it became impossible to pretend the amount of money in the funds would be enough the pay for all the promised pensions. This has resulted in the paradoxical situation where taxes and tax revenue are going up, but the budget has to be cut - because the extra money is going into paying up those underfunded pensions. Basically, all the money they spent on other things besides pensions in the past, they're having to pay back into the pensions now (past generations stole from the current generation).
The USPS pension pre-funding requirement is basically "if you promise you'll pay someone in the future, put aside enough money now to pay for it." That the requirement has been onerous to the USPS is just an indication that the pension had been underfunded for the past decades. If they'd been keeping up with their pension funding instead of relying on wildly optimistic fund growth estimates to make it look like it was adequately funded, then the USPS wouldn't have had to pay any more than they already were. In other words, if the requirement wasn't hurting the USPS, then that would be evidence that the requirement wasn't needed. But the fact that it is hurting the USPS is evidence that the requirement was needed to halt financial mismanagement before it ballooned into an even bigger problem in the future.
Whether you like President Trump, or whether you hate him. There's one thing that everyone seems to agree upon. And that is how refreshing it is to get that Negro animal out of the White House, along with his fat ass butt-o-rama "wife". The jury is still out on whether that she-male is truly a woman, or if it's a transexual.
Anyhow, liver lips Obama wasn't even a real Negro. He is a Halfrican American -- half Negro/half American.
And haven't you noticed how Negros always have a musky odor? Kind of like wet animal fur, or some kind of weird glandular excretions. Can you imagine how hard it was to air out the White House after the Obama's left? Heavens to Betsy!
By my reading they had a net operating loss of $2.742B in FY17, on a mail volume of 149.5B. That means they're charging about $0.00183 per mail item less than what it actually costs to ship.
Since that report doesn't tell us how much each service costs as compared to its revenue, we can't tell if any service is subsidizing any other (each service is supposed to pay for itself). We can't tell from that whether Amazon is subsidizing first-class, for example.
To make the USPS services make a profit, however, a simple 2-cent increase per piece of mail across the board would be enough.
The report also shows that package services yielded $19.5B in revenue on 5.75B packages weighing 11B pounds. In comparison, UPS delivered 5.1B packages globally in 2017 and FedEx delivered about 1B packages in the US in FY17. So while the package services may be a miniscule portion of their mail volume, they're still the market leader in that segment.
dom
For the last 6 months here, AMZ packages AREN'T USPS delivered.
Crazy much?
"Citation please?"
"Trump HAS been unfairly treated by the Washington Post..."
"Bozo"
"Bozo is a big boy.,"
Let's see. Asking for a citation, when you'd have to be illiterate, or partisan, or living in your Mom's basement playing CoD all day, to not know a bazillion examples. And all the rest.
Yes, I see it now. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you The Deplorable!
Trump Sr. will probably avoid prison, but not because he's innocent or doesn't deserve it. The office of the presidency will likely shield him from indictment.
Trump Jr. on the other hand, is dead to rights. As is Kushner and probably Ivanka.
The only reason those 3 haven't been locked up yet is because they continue to be useful and keep flapping their gums about more and more crimes. The moment they cease to be useful to Mueller, they'll be locked up.
Why do people like you, who wail about the Post Office and California, never seem to have a problem with those same funding plans are used by states like Texas, federal and city law enforcement pensions, or publicly traded companies, like... All of them?
Hypocrite much?
The solution to post office losses is to close underperforming post offices. In other words, the solution is to close post offices and lower delivery in rural areas and maybe even any city with under 100,000 people.
The voters in those area should be thrilled with such obvious budget reform. They can use the YUGE tax cuts to pay for gas to pick it up themselves or to get it FedExed.
..to book a couple hundred million in losses.
Amazon doesn't need tax payer subsidies to stay profitable. Bezos has enough money to do what he needs. Why shouldn't the USPS postal workers get more money for their pensions?? Why I ask you.
Actually, it's even worse than that.
The Postal Service gives priority in hiring to military veterans. Sounds great, right? But in terms of their pension, when a vet is hired by the Postal Service, the portion of the vet's future pension that would have been paid via the military, now has to be funded by the Postal Service instead. Thus making the military's pension funding look better, and the Postal Service's pension funding even more onerous.
I'd like to meet the evil genius who came up with that one, to be honest.
Did you miss the part where the postmaster general said that these arrangements are beneficial to the post office?
Did you miss the fact the financial reports indicate otherwise?
Every single one of you drones brought up pension payments, as if the Post Office could simply not pay pensions. The cost of shipping a package includes servicing debt, but I guess most Slashdot people are too buttery retarded to know even the simplest thing about how a business works.
BTW, "Buttery Retarded" is a phrase that is the sole invention of Autocorrect, but it seemed so apt in this context I bowed the superior wisdom of The Machine.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Megan Brennan has skin in the game, too. She's also a party to the same deal.
Given that she's expected to have the Post Office's welfare at heart I'd be more impressed by her statements. But I'd prefer an analysis by someone who's not one of the players.
Though I have no indication that Megan has any conflict of interests or is in any way corrupt, a multi-billionaire is in a position to deliver a LOT of incentives. So I'd like to hear an analysis by a less interested party.
BUT
You're totally misconstruing my original statement. "The Postmaster General says ..." is one thing. "Jeff Bezos' newspaper says the Postmater General says ..." is very much another. It's the latter I'm addressing.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
The relevant bit of history is Nixon's enemies list, in which he ordered IRS audits to "screw" his political enemies. In that case, the IRS commissioner Donald Alexander also refused to follow the order to perform the audits, and stored the order in the sealed envelope in his safe until the enemies list was outed by WH Counsel John Dean.
As an aside: there are other bits of that article of impeachment that Trump's folks have been accusing his political enemies of violating, particularly with the FBI and surveillance. That's a neat trick of acting Nixonian whist accusing your enemies of acting Nixonian, I don't know if that counts as projection or muddying the waters, or if it even reaches the heights of Orwellianism. Or perhaps it is simply a childish "no, you are!"
Since he will likely plead the fifth, even though he has consistently lied the entire time to the public, he likely will not lie under oath, technically.
The fact that so many idiots have to rely on a technicality to keep from admitting they elected a piece of shit and correcting the issue, however, is fucking shameful.
That is incorrect. In Article I, Section 8 the Constitution grants Congress the power to "establish Post Offices and post Roads". If they don't believe Post Offices or post Roads are needed, they are free not to exercise that power and to dismantle said system. In fact, right now, are are there many (any?) active "Post roads" of note in the United States? It seems likely that the postal service will be dismantled in the next 50 years as there will just be insufficient need for it.
Is it also your belief that because Congress has the power to declare war that they should do so even if they don't think it's necessary?
Why is there an "insightful" mod and why isn't it "-1"? If I wanted insight, I wouldn't be reading
It's easy, and lazy, to say "Trump's mad at Bezos, so he's going sfter Amazon's shipping". That's easy, and dumb.
Trump the businessman had his own Boeing 767 airliner and steup his own supply lines for some of his business activities; he clearly understands this stuff and indeed would certainly try to abuse the system as Bezos does were he in that sort of business. Let's face it: even Trump's enemies presume he is ruthless and good at taking advantage.
The alternate view is that businessman Trump is looking at government and saying "Hey, THAT's just stupid!" when he sees the USPS delivering packages at below-cost rates for Amazon, and then the USPS needing constant taxpayer bailouts AND simultaneously brick-ansd-mortar retailers all around the country complaining about unfair competition from Amazon as their incomes (and thus the taxes they pay) dwindle and Amazon dodges taxes. Bezos is being a ruthless businessman, and there is something in his drive for efficiency and performance that is admirable - but that does not mean it's necessarily good for the taxpayer, and it's hardly whacko for Trump to notice that, it's actually a bit refreshing. Most politicians would shut up and hope Bezos would support them or at the very least have his Washington Post not savage them.
That's been the GOP plan all along. They'll use that to "prove" that private enterprise is always better, smarter and cost-effective, they'll find a way to screw the workers out of their pensions and amend the constitution to either get rid of $govt_svc or to allow its functions to fulfilled by corporations entirely.
Combine that with Drumpf's hate-boner for anything associated with Jeff Bezos plus his belief that he should be able to run the government to the benefit of his business interests, and...
And there you have it in a nutshell. We're done here.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Except the USPS pension pre-funding was for employees not yet employed, not just for those on the books.
You people must have seen, "Donald Trump Toys With Abuse Of Office In Beef Against Washington Post | Rachel Maddow | MSNBC" on YouTube, right?
No, you're still losing money. You're just losing less of it, and in this case it is Amazon that is paying less than others.
Depends on the maths used, because as with airline tickets, each seat is sold at a different price to different people. So if the average seat cost was $100, I can still make a profit selling some seats for $200 and others for $50. This is a common free market method for maximising revenue per service.
What Trump is proposing is effectively socialist price controls, ie the government setting fixed fees. Fair enough if you support Soviet style policy, but I'm pretty sure that's not what most Trump voters voted for.
I think you need to work on your understanding of the prefix 'pre'
You had your turn, corporatist, it's time for non corrupt candidate. If it's not a Bernie Sander - like candidate, it's time for an option that is not bought: a third party.
With the flight analogy, the flight might cost $200 per passenger on average. So you charge $300, and fill 90% of the seats, say. If there are 100 seats, then this represents $3000 revenue not collected. However, much of the cost of the flight is finance for the plane, back office, having a pilot, etc (still required) that is not strongly tied to the number of passengers on board (only the meals and fuel is, really). So the marginal additional cost of each of those passengers might be $40 each. In which case at $50 you are making profit on them. More than this, you are potentially making a profit on their onward connection, possibly at a higher profit margin. Plus you make the person well-disposed towards your airline as they got a bargain, and you hope next time they might buy the $300 seat. Given the last two, making $0 may be worthwhile. In terms of food, by the way, you need to order the meals in advance, so even if there are ten seats unsold, you may actually have 20 meals for them (given that a choice tends to be offered) that might go to waste, so the marginal cost of food might be close to $0, apart from the avgas required to get them aloft.
Why would they expect military veterans to be more suitable as postmen?
Extensive firearms training.
he who rules like a king will die like a king. unpleasantly.
"There's one thing that everyone seems to agree upon. "
Not so fast cowboy, I certainly dont agree with your backwards racism.
Can't believe the concept of bulk discounts somehow shocks you.
Amazon pays the same rates every other company shipping millions of packages a year do.
Actually he has done things that send non-rich people to jail, often for a long time. Simple example, he used his teen USA position to go where underage girls were changing.
20 years and billions of dollars and the most Hillary was found guilty of was bieng a bitch. Which isn't a crime.
Goldwater, bengahzi. Private email server which every congressman has too. She never broke a law, but she wasn't moral, or likeable.
Trump dealt with foriegn powers to get dirt on his opponents. Which is dirty and a gray area in law too. He routinely skirted and abused laws. Whether he broke laws I don't know. Don't care. Trump will be Trump. When he is done the USA will be broken, the GOP will be broken. And a year or two later, the democrat party will break.
It will be his gift to the USA, not to make America great but to humble it.
I expect the world's reserve currency to drift away from the dollar in the next 10 years due to his trade negotations destroying American ability and economic growth.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
If both President and VP go down, then the Speaker of the House becomes President. Then Senate President Pro Tempore.
This leaves us with Paul Ryan and then Orrin Hatch.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Even if collusion happened, that isn't a crime. Otherwise every democratic candidate and operative since before 2000 would be in jail from working with moveon.org and Soros foundation. Sorry, but at the end of the day, none of what is accused is a crime. I think we can all agree Trump didnt order any hacking of the DNC and benefitted only after things were already public.
Did you notice that there are other companies paying the same rates as Amazon?
The USPS loads their trucks based on the class of mail.Express Mail first, then 1st Class/Priority, with Bulk Rate being last. Discounts are based on pre-sorting with a minimum number being required.
If the packages are pre-sorted based on a 3 digit zip code (100xx) there's a discount. If they're pre-sorted based on a 5 digit zip code (10012) there's a bigger discount.
Anyone can get the same discounted prices as Amazon if they meet the same minimum number of pieces and pre-sorting.
Trump is using the same argument ISP use to implement usage based billing. You use more so you cost us more. Contact ? read the fine print ? What fine print ? Oh, wait a minute, there , we just added it. You didn't agree to the new terms ? Go with another provider then. What ? You don't have another provider , so sorry, guess that means we have you where we want you . Only Trump forgets that unlike ISP users , amazon can choose to not only switch providers, they can create their own .
Then the Limit is to be 3% cheaper than UPS
20 years and billions of dollars and the most Hillary was found guilty of was bieng a bitch. Which isn't a crime.
Goldwater, bengahzi. Private email server which every congressman has too. She never broke a law, but she wasn't moral, or likeable.
Looking at the evidence of her server issues, what happened rose to the level of a security violation, not an imprisonable offense. As for Behghazi, I wonder where the outrage was during 2000 to 2008. People need to see how many were killed at US embassies during that golden era.
And I like Barry Goldwater
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
He is ripe for jail. Supporting NRA is close to attempted murder
Because the post office manages to be efficient and self sufficient, it angers all the government-is-evil politicians.
You have obviously never step foot in my local post office. Efficient is the last word I would ever use to describe them.
Nice to meet you then.
I order a shitload of stuff from Amazon. I have never had a package lost or destroyed by UPS. It's been delayed a few times, but that's usually by things like hurricanes or forest fires. Every single time I see USPS, "Smartpost" or similar as the delivery method, I cringe. I have had stuff just disappear while "out for delivery" only to be marked by the USPS tracking as an exception. I've had stuff sit for seven days at me local Post Office. It common to have Amazon blow my Prime shipping promised delivery date when the USPS is involved because reasons... I bitch, and I get an apology from Amazon and it shows up a day or two later.
I don't think I'll renew my Prime when it comes due. I only use it for shipping anyway. More and more stuff ships USPS and I can't count on it arriving on time so I might as well take five day shipping.
Eliminating the Post Office as a government sponsored entity would not require an amendment to the United States Constitution.
Article I, Section 8 of the United States Constitution gives Congress the power to "establish Post Offices and post Roads" if they see fit. It does not obligate them to do so. Given that they have the power to establish them, they also have the power to dismantle them.
Congress, for example, also has the power under Article I to "borrow Money on the credit of the United States", but Congress has no obligation to run a national debt which requires borrowing such money. Congress also has the power to "declare War", but they have no obligation to do so or to insure the United States has at least one active declared war.
It's more complicated than that. They have to fund pensions for current employees based on life expectancy. They have to estimate liabilities over a 75 year period, and that does include people who don't currently work there. So USPS has a a future liability that does include people who aren't even born yet, but they're not required to actually come up with the money yet.
What good is being president of the most powerfuyl country in the world if you cannot use that power to go after your personal enemies and amass great wealth?
This just in, Trump popukarity has risen since the election.
But of course, that is 'in the tank for Trump' CNN...
Ken
I occasionally get a mis-delivered mailpiece at a frequency of about once a year. I get a lost package, well, never. Amazon deliveries are a couple times a week on average. The electronic reporting of impending and actual deliveries from the USPS is better than UPS (by far) and somewhat better even than Amazon, mostly because I get an image of almost every mailpiece emailed to me 6 days a week. I am a completely satisfied USPS customer.
And, Iâ(TM)m assuming, you are just another pathologically partisan dumb fuck who is bitching because they piece of shit YOU voted for did not get elected. Go choke yourself, cretin. Hypocrite.
-- "I'm not in a hurry; I'm in Hawaii." The Homeless Guy
They got around this with Nixon by naming him an indicted coconspirator...
First, there was an actual crime or two committed (Collusion is not a possible crime here)... Second, the charging document did NOT name Nixon, but everyone assumed the unnamed, uncharged conspirator was him.. Third, Nixon never was charged or went to jail (though Ford could be seen as responsible for that).
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Well...
President Trump personally urged the leader of the U.S. Postal Service to double the rates the agency charges Amazon and other firms
They're not charging half what FedEx and UPS charge. Doubling the fee would thus mean they're charging more than what FedEx and UPS charge.
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Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post. Trump is pissed off because of unflattering articles the Post writes about him. So Trump figures he can use the USPS to punish Bezos by raising rates.In other words, Trump is trying to use a government agency to go after enemies and this is exactly what landed Nixon in hot water.