I do not know of a single Government "business" that is not losing money and a complete disaster. From the Post Office, Medicare, Social Security, DMV,. Entities that take in money and should, with any business sense, be a reliable source of revenue for the government, are instead a brutal liability. They are also terribly run with horrible customer service and completely unreliable people. That is what happens when you hire based on quotas, not hiring the most qualified people. I do a lot of stuff through USPS and I have about a 60-70% success rate. UPS and FedEx are near 100% because they have to be. The USPS doesn't really care because there's no accountability
The Clockwork Angel Collection...brought to you by Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and Chase TheClockworkAngelCollection
its funny because where I live there at 3 post offices within 2 miles of each other. 3 years ago they were open 6 days a week and now 1 is open 8-4:30 M-F, another is open MWF 2-4, and the final being opened 8-12pm. Boy have times changed
I do a lot of stuff through USPS and I have about a 60-70% success rate
Success rate based on what? Packages arriving to their scheduled destination? That cannot be accurate.
The USPS gets a lot of flak but are extremely reliable, imo, considering the volume of packages they handle on a daily basis. And what other entity is going to take your envelope and carry it up to 3,000 miles for you for less than 50 cents? Fed Ex and UPS would have far worse track records if they had to shoulder the volume the USPS handles on a daily basis. And if you think $2 to ship a graded card is high, what do you think UPS or Fed Ex is going to charge you?
Disclaimer: I am not a USPS employee but I do think that they take an unfair amount of criticism, considering the circumstances.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
Agree. I also love the USPS . Id pick them over any shipping company, which is why Im sad to see all this happen to them. I feel they just opened up way to many shops/buildings . Like someone said earlier. I know of a few areas where you can throw a rock to the next USPS post office. Just to many. They are acutally cut down on them now. But it looks like its to late. I also know if they get ride of sat delievery, it will most likely be that way for the rest of my life. I enjoy getting mail on sats.
The USPS is the exact reason why governments running something that the private industry can do is a mistake. First, you can argue who is at fault for forcing the USPS to pre-pay pensions, but you wouldnt have that discussion if the unions didnt demand them in the first place. In either case, pre-paying pensions by the numbers mentioned in this thread only amount to about 33% of the amount the USPS loses every year. There still is a 10 billion dollar loss even if that pension issue wasnt there
Secondly, I understand the theory that the USPS has lost a lot of business from the dying "letter" size mail due to email and other internet issues, but the same internet has created a large package business via ebay and other sites which should just about be a wash when it comes to sales. Cutting out Sat delivery isnt going to affect anyone, in fact, I would say cutting out Wed. delivery would help as well.
Finally, it is not the fault of the postal workers...most of which work hard and do their job as they are told, the problem is the organization level. The post office doesnt NEED to delivery packages....there already is private companies doing that (FedEx, DHL, UPS). The post office should be streamlined into a letter and/or small package (bubble mailer) carrier only, that is subsidized like a lot of "needed" industries, by the US government as a public service. The USPS should have never been about profit in the first place. Going to letters only, means cutting about HALF the jobs out, but as business changes, we shouldnt keep people in jobs where they arent needed. Have you talked to an ATT long distance operator in the last 10 years, as an example?
It is remarkable that folks don't seem to understand that the 2006 Act was passed specifically to kill the post office and the post office monopoly on letter delivery.
As for last years losses by the Post office (~$15 billion) operating losses were $2.4 billion, pension payments accounted for $11 billion (they deferred their 2011 pension payment) in losses and other labor related losses were ~$1.6 billion. Certainly not the healthiest of companies but management attempts to restructure could fix their operating losses (assuming Congress would get out of the way, admittedly there is no chance of that).
The post office is far from the only entity that has significant long term pension/medical liabilities but public companies are able to fudge their plan numbers to avoid the sort of mandated payments the post office has been trying to make. Many public companies have enormous pension/medical liabilities but they simply kick the can down the road. Knowing that eventually when the liabilities become too large they will declare bankruptcy, get bought by a vulture capitalist group, get their pensions and medical liabilities thrown out or shifted to PBGC in bankruptcy court, then sell the company at a profit (now that their "costs" are more manageable) or take the "restructured" company public. Unfortunately this little trick does not work for government entities so some serious public pension reform is going to be necessary. I do not see any politician tackling this problem until it becomes an actual crisis instead of a pending one since they will undoubtedly get voted out of office when they try.
It is funny how "unions" have become the latest and greatest corporate boogeyman. Last year S&P 500 companies recorded their highest profits per $1 in revenue and paid out the lowest percentage of GDP in wages ever, in other words companies made more money and paid less in wages than ever before. The systematic destruction of unions in the US is one of the drivers of this trend. All of this is great if you are in the upper echelon of a company but the vast majority of folks are not and have simply seen stagnant wages and more work. Most people are becoming corporate serfs and do not even realize it.
I say all of this never having worked for a union, never having had a pension, and now owning a small business. I think there is plenty wrong with unions but folks seem to forget that nearly all of the advances in the workplace for employees are a direct result of unions. Destroying them in the end only benefits companies and those running them. Collective bargaining is many times the only effective means for improving the workplace & wages. I'm confident people are going to throw out the same hackneyed union complaints (heck most of them have already surfaced on this thread) but in the end who do you trust to represent your best interests? The folks leading and running the company who have seen their wages and bonuses skyrocket to all time highs, whose success depends on suppressing wage growth and extracting more efficiencies from the workforce?
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
Comments
TheClockworkAngelCollection
<< <i>If you read the comments under this article on yahoo. Everyone is for them not doing mail on sat. I bet most on here love sat mail days.
I do >>
Reading comments under Yahoo articles is a great way to lower you IQ.
Success rate based on what? Packages arriving to their scheduled destination? That cannot be accurate.
The USPS gets a lot of flak but are extremely reliable, imo, considering the volume of packages they handle
on a daily basis. And what other entity is going to take your envelope and carry it up to 3,000 miles for you
for less than 50 cents? Fed Ex and UPS would have far worse track records if they had to shoulder the
volume the USPS handles on a daily basis. And if you think $2 to ship a graded card is high, what do you
think UPS or Fed Ex is going to charge you?
Disclaimer: I am not a USPS employee but I do think that they take an unfair amount of criticism, considering
the circumstances.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
I also love the USPS . Id pick them over any shipping company, which is why Im sad to see all this happen to them. I feel they just opened up way to many shops/buildings . Like someone said earlier. I know of a few areas where you can throw a rock to the next USPS post office. Just to many. They are acutally cut down on them now. But it looks like its to late. I also know if they get ride of sat delievery, it will most likely be that way for the rest of my life. I enjoy getting mail on sats.
Secondly, I understand the theory that the USPS has lost a lot of business from the dying "letter" size mail due to email and other internet issues, but the same internet has created a large package business via ebay and other sites which should just about be a wash when it comes to sales. Cutting out Sat delivery isnt going to affect anyone, in fact, I would say cutting out Wed. delivery would help as well.
Finally, it is not the fault of the postal workers...most of which work hard and do their job as they are told, the problem is the organization level. The post office doesnt NEED to delivery packages....there already is private companies doing that (FedEx, DHL, UPS). The post office should be streamlined into a letter and/or small package (bubble mailer) carrier only, that is subsidized like a lot of "needed" industries, by the US government as a public service. The USPS should have never been about profit in the first place. Going to letters only, means cutting about HALF the jobs out, but as business changes, we shouldnt keep people in jobs where they arent needed. Have you talked to an ATT long distance operator in the last 10 years, as an example?
As for last years losses by the Post office (~$15 billion) operating losses were $2.4 billion, pension payments accounted for $11 billion (they deferred their 2011 pension payment) in losses and other labor related losses were ~$1.6 billion. Certainly not the healthiest of companies but management attempts to restructure could fix their operating losses (assuming Congress would get out of the way, admittedly there is no chance of that).
The post office is far from the only entity that has significant long term pension/medical liabilities but public companies are able to fudge their plan numbers to avoid the sort of mandated payments the post office has been trying to make. Many public companies have enormous pension/medical liabilities but they simply kick the can down the road. Knowing that eventually when the liabilities become too large they will declare bankruptcy, get bought by a vulture capitalist group, get their pensions and medical liabilities thrown out or shifted to PBGC in bankruptcy court, then sell the company at a profit (now that their "costs" are more manageable) or take the "restructured" company public. Unfortunately this little trick does not work for government entities so some serious public pension reform is going to be necessary. I do not see any politician tackling this problem until it becomes an actual crisis instead of a pending one since they will undoubtedly get voted out of office when they try.
It is funny how "unions" have become the latest and greatest corporate boogeyman. Last year S&P 500 companies recorded their highest profits per $1 in revenue and paid out the lowest percentage of GDP in wages ever, in other words companies made more money and paid less in wages than ever before. The systematic destruction of unions in the US is one of the drivers of this trend. All of this is great if you are in the upper echelon of a company but the vast majority of folks are not and have simply seen stagnant wages and more work. Most people are becoming corporate serfs and do not even realize it.
I say all of this never having worked for a union, never having had a pension, and now owning a small business. I think there is plenty wrong with unions but folks seem to forget that nearly all of the advances in the workplace for employees are a direct result of unions. Destroying them in the end only benefits companies and those running them. Collective bargaining is many times the only effective means for improving the workplace & wages. I'm confident people are going to throw out the same hackneyed union complaints (heck most of them have already surfaced on this thread) but in the end who do you trust to represent your best interests? The folks leading and running the company who have seen their wages and bonuses skyrocket to all time highs, whose success depends on suppressing wage growth and extracting more efficiencies from the workforce?
Robb
For me?
It's one less day I get a pile of junk mail.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.