Congress forces Postal Service into default.

[cubby1223]

The postal service gets no money from the government. How are we 'pumping money into it'?

First, where in my post did I specify where the money comes from?

Second, why should I care if the post office decides to cut 150k unnecessary jobs for a service that is increasingly unnecessary?

Congress should eliminate these prefunding requirements, but beyond that...

 

[Pr0d1gy]

You want to know how modern Economics work in this country now? Even after they toss out 150k jobs you will still pay the same amount to deliver your packages. So much for cost/profit, supply, & demand.

 

[EagleKeeper]

You want to know how modern Economics work in this country now? Even after they toss out 150k jobs you will still pay the same amount to deliver your packages. So much for cost/profit, supply, & demand.

If they are not allowed to increase prices; they have to cut costs.
If not they run a deficit; which Congress is not allowing.

It is very simple the way a business runs. Except that instead of a deficit, they close the doors. Some here feel that a company should never run a profit or close it's doors. Just rely on handouts and IOUs.

But put out an offer for them to work for less or no wages, and they will scream!

 

[Phokus]

This is bullshit, why the fuck does the postal service have to prefund their pensions for 75 years, while no other corporation or government agency has to do that? They're funding pensions for people who aren't even born yet! Most of their losses are coming from this bullshit law that Bush signed. In fact, i remember reading that they'd be profitable if not for this law.

 

[blankslate]

Without the pension Prepayments the Postal service would have broke even or turned a profit for the fiscal years 2007 on after the 2006 bill was passed.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/five-things/the-u-s-postal-service/11433/

Under the mandate, the USPS is required to make an annual $5.5 billion payment over ten years, through 2016.These “prepayments” are largely responsible for the USPS’s financial losses over the past four years and the threat of shutdown that looms ahead – take the retirement fund out of the equation, and the postal service would have actually netted $1 billion in profits over this period.

Other organizations are allowed to spread out their pension payments beyond a mere ten years so why was the USPS forced to do it all within a relatively short period of time?

That is the question. Of course people who have some real or imagined interest seeing the USPS fail will just conveniently pretend the question doesn't matter.

 

[Double Trouble]

Congress should eliminate these prefunding requirements, but beyond that...

On the one hand, requiring the post office to pre-fund when other agencies and companies are not required to do so seems silly. On the other hand, if they don't pre-fund this, it just ends up being another gigantonormous unfunded liability that the taxpayer will likely end up paying for down the line when the bill comes due.

I think congress should take a good look at requiring that every company that offers defined benefit retirement options pre-fund it for 50 years or so. Employees who grow old and don't have the option to re-enter the workplace should not get screwed when the company is no longer able to handle it's obligations.

 

[fskimospy]

On the one hand, requiring the post office to pre-fund when other agencies and companies are not required to do so seems silly. On the other hand, if they don't pre-fund this, it just ends up being another gigantonormous unfunded liability that the taxpayer will likely end up paying for down the line when the bill comes due.

I think congress should take a good look at requiring that every company that offers defined benefit retirement options pre-fund it for 50 years or so. Employees who grow old and don't have the option to re-enter the workplace should not get screwed when the company is no longer able to handle it's obligations.

Requiring agencies to fund their pensions is a great idea, but Congress forced the USPS to pre-fund a huge amount into the future in a very short time frame. It really appears to me to be a deliberate move to blow the USPS's finances.

 

[Double Trouble]

Requiring agencies to fund their pensions is a great idea, but Congress forced the USPS to pre-fund a huge amount into the future in a very short time frame. It really appears to me to be a deliberate move to blow the USPS's finances.

Agreed, it looks like the USPS is being used as a pawn for political purposes. They're caught in the crossfire. I don't see why they should be singled out to pre-fund more (and a lot more quickly) than other companies or agencies.

 

[Pr0d1gy]

This is bullshit, why the fuck does the postal service have to prefund their pensions for 75 years, while no other corporation or government agency has to do that? They're funding pensions for people who aren't even born yet! Most of their losses are coming from this bullshit law that Bush signed. In fact, i remember reading that they'd be profitable if not for this law.

But, but, my party supports Capitalism and Free Enterprise.....don't they?

 

[momeNt]

Congress granted itself the power to run the postal service back when we were thirteen colonies. You can't have expected it to remain a public service this whole time. Our infrastructure has outgrown the capabilities of a publicly provided service.

I just hope that when the bill passed all you guys put all bought options for UPS and Fedex, because this will be very good for business.

 

[Charles Kozierok]

Run it like any business.

If they were really going to do that, the first thing they would do is jack up prices for those in rural areas, where it costs a lot more to operate. Ironically, this would cause postage prices to skyrocket mostly in the "red" areas that constantly complain about how much the postal service costs.

It's not run like a business because it isn't a business. It's a national service.