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"Franklin Statue at the Old Post Office" by FredoAlvarez on flickr. Statue of Benjamin Franklin, the first Postmaster General, at the Old Post Office in Washington, D.C
On September 27, 2011, in over 300 cities, postal workers will rally their communities to save the US postal services. Letter carrier Michael Plaskon has written a short essay to help us to understand the effort to destroy this public service so that it can be privatized for profit.
What’s the real story behind the postal crisis?
By Michael G. Plaskon, Executive Vice President, National Association of Letter Carriers, Branch 84, Pittsburgh, PA.
In every Congressional District across America, Postal Service unionists are organizing rallies to be held on Tuesday, September 27, 2011. The National Association of Letter Carriers is collaborating with the American Postal Workers Union, National Postal Mailhandlers Union, and the National Rural Letter Carriers Association to hold rallies at every elected representative’s office to make the point that only Congress can fix the financial difficulties facing the United States Postal Service (USPS). Congress passed a law in 2006 placing the postal service in its current fiscal situation, and it is only Congress that can solve the problem by enacting H. R. 1351.
Neither workers nor our unions caused this crisis.
In 2006, Congress passed the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. This law requires the Postal Service to do something that no other business or government agency has to do–pre-fund its FUTURE retiree health care benefits. This is a 75 year liability that has to be paid in 10 years. The Postal Service makes a payment of approximately $5.5 billion on September 30 at the end of every fiscal year to meet this obligation. The Post Office has been paying these benefits the past four years into a trust fund for employees who have not even been born yet. This is the burden that is creating the “financial crisis” for the Post Office. The recession that has gripped America the past few years has undoubtedly affected the Postal Service, but even in the worst economic times since the great depression, the USPS has had a net profit of $611 million dollars. Unfortunately, the red ink associated with the post office is the mandated pre-funding since 2006.
We can solve the problem without eliminating jobs and services.
This onerous payment is barely being reported in the media. Another fact not being widely circulated is that independent agencies and the government itself have concluded that the USPS has overpaid into its two retirement systems. The Post Office has excessively funded the Civil Service Retirement System by at least $50 billion dollars, and the Federal Employees Retirement System around $7 billion dollars. This gives Congress an opportunity to fix the problem by passing H.R 1351, the United States Postal Service Pension Obligation Recalculation and Restoration Act of 2011. This bill, among many introduced in Congress, is the only one that will address the pressing financial concerns of the post office in a responsible manner without eliminating jobs and services to the American public. The bill introduced by Rep. Stephen Lynch has 211 co-sponsors. This will not be a bailout or cost the citizens of the United States a single penny in taxes. It will simply transfer the overpayments in the retirement system into the future retiree health care obligation. If this law is passed there will be no other company in the United States that can claim two fully funded pensions and a fully funded current and future retiree health care benefits plan.
Why the gloom and doom?
So why all the gloom and doom? There cannot be a claim that “legacy costs” or “benefits” are destroying the USPS. Productivity and reliability can’t be a factor. The Post Office adds a million new delivery points each year and has simultaneously reduced the number of employees nationwide from over 700,000 three years ago to about 590,000 today. On time delivery service standards are at an all time high. The Postal Service has been named the most trusted government agency six years running. So why does Postmaster General Patrick Donahue insist on a plan that eliminates a day of mail delivery service, closes over 3,000 Post Offices and more than half the mail processing plants in the country, and guts the collective bargaining rights of its organized employees by redefining the retirement and health care benefit plans? Disaster Capitalism!
A manufactured crisis
If you have read Naomi Klein’s book “The Shock Doctrine,” then you know what I am talking about. It is almost as if Congress and the USPS headquarters are treating it like a page out of a playbook–manufacture a financial crisis and insist drastic measures must be taken immediately before any facts and public input can get in the way. Seize the opportunity to break the unions and dismantle a reliable public service so the capitalists can let the free market perform what the government couldn’t do–but for a profit. That is what the Postmaster General’s proposals will accomplish–eliminate Saturday delivery and open the door to private competitors. Once that advantage is gone and revenues decline, then why not eliminate Tuesday mail delivery service, then Thursday mail delivery, and so on?
USPS has plans to eliminate over 100,000 jobs and 3,000 post offices.
But how will the private sector respond? Will they have universal pricing and service? Of course not. Those who have a mail box at the end of a dirt road or live in a community that is not affluent will not be profitable, and the service will not be affordable. These are the folks who need the Postal Service the most. The plan to eliminate half the mail processing centers nationwide will delay the time it takes to deliver first class mail. The USPS is planning on lowering its service standards by a day or two once the plan is implemented. What company in their right mind intentionally “plans” on lowering its standards unless they are trying to fail? The closures of an additional 3,000+ post offices will diminish the purpose of the service that binds the nation together. Americans will be inconvenienced to use the USPS and the trust will deteriorate. Changing the retirement and health benefit plans fundamentally alters the collective bargaining agreements. These plans will eliminate over 100,000 jobs at a time when this country cannot afford that kind of blow to the economy. It is unfortunate and hypocritical that the Obama administration has advocated the elimination of Saturday delivery service as part of the deficit-reduction package while insisting on the need for job creation. The U.S. Postal Service is critical to our economy. We deliver mail, medicine, and packages on time and for good price.
Rally with us on September 27!
I hope all unionists across America, who appreciate the hard work of their brothers and sisters in the Postal Service, will support them by attending the rallies on Tuesday, September 27. Bring some friends who rely on the USPS. Let your voice be heard; advocate for H. R. 1351!
Rally Locations and Times.
For details on rally locations and more information, please go to http://www.saveamericaspostalservice.org/ or the National Association of Letter Carriers web-site at http://www.nalc.org/ This legislation will address the immediate concerns of the adverse effects the burden of health care places on the Postal Service.
NALC seeks continued support and passage of single payer, HR 676.
But, like all labor organizations faced with the health care dilemma, the ultimate long term goal of the NALC is the continued support and passage of single payer. The Postal Service would not have to fund retiree health care benefits, let alone future employee benefits, if single payer, specifically H. R. 676, were the law.
I hope to see you on September 27th.
Distributed by:
All Unions Committee For Single Payer Health Care–HR 676
c/o Nurses Professional Organization (NPO)
1169 Eastern Parkway, Suite 2218
Louisville, KY 40217
(502) 636 1551
Email: nursenpo@aol.com
http://unionsforsinglepayer.org/
9/22/11
12 Comments
You can take action to help save the postal services here:
http://act.rootsaction.org/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=4782
While I don’t doubt what Plaskon writes is true I find it interesting that he doesn’t bring up the following issues.
1) Decline in postal services needed by consumers due to email and fax.
2) Severe decline of “junk mail” as companies have found the Internet and develop their own websites and drop the expense of catalogs.
3)Loss of mailing service as newspapers and magazines have completely died out or have developed on-line only.
4)Farming out of mail services to “pack and ship” centers and other businesses which are paid for providing mail services as post offices with no bump up service charges.
5)Contiuing loss of business to UPS and FedEx which the Postal Service has never recovered from.
6)The postal service becoming its own worse enemy offering on-line postage.
7)Spending money on TV advertising and sponsorship of events.
http://directmag.com/news/marketing_usps_blasted_sports
The list goes on and on.
The above needs to be brought into the conversation which Plaskon conveniently dosen’t include.
Yet despite your list, the Post Office made a profit of $611 Million, if you don’t count the pre-funding mandate.
But unfortunately you can’t. All factor into the equation.
It’s not fair but it is what it is.
I’ve heard GOPers relate the USPO to prisons–they think it needs to be privatized.
Big double-standard in evidence here;
GM management was allowed to under-fund their retiree’s pension funds to the tune of $39 Billion, declare that amount as profit and pay themselves bonuses, the USPO is ordered by congress to over-fund it’s retiree’s pension fund so as to look as if it’s in worse financial shape than it is.
GM management gets to keep their false-profit bonuses and eventually pass the under-funded pension problem on to the UAW, USPO has pre-funded pensions for employees who haven’t been born yet, however can’t get out out of the forced pre-funding because?
All part of the same union-busting plan.
Two points:
1. Business need the Post Office to deliver Advertising and Bills.
2. “The Post Office has been paying these benefits the past four years into a trust fund for employees who have not even been born yet.”
Call this what it is – an Asset Strip of the Post Office. Just as the Baby Boomers paid into another trust fund which is in the process of being Asset Stripped.
Disengenuous. It’s the prefunding mandate that NO other business has to meet that is causing the real problem. you can seperate that to address the pressing issues at hand. Why is that so hard to understand?
BTW, on you point 3 with Magazine, there was a change that greatly increased the postage costs of many magazine so the dry up may be in part due to that.
Regardless, the main issue is the prefunding mandate that has been going on for several years now thanks to teh Reprobate-ican Party. The other issues pale to that.
I’ll add many internet business need the PO to deliver their goods that they sell.
I’ll also add that the PO has picked up much business from all the new mail order business from the internet companies (e.g. Amazon).
And no, these things do not need to be bought in the conversation. That is for another day. The pressing problem is identified—Republican sabotage, as usual. A solutons is avaiable, repeal the law and allow the post office to operate on a more level playing field with other businesses. Voila.
Absolutely. I just watched a huge lie fest on the part of Gene A. Del Polito of the Association of Postal Commerce on this morning’s DemocracyNow.Org broadcast. The Congress has been diverting the profits of USPS and lobbyists can’t wait to break the union and privatize this lucrative part of the US Federal infrastructure which the bankstas don’t control (e.g. money orders).