postal service shows 5.2 BILLION loss for 3rd qt

WASHINGTON (AP) — The nearly bankrupt U.S. Postal Service on Thursday reported losses of $57 million per day in the last quarter and warned it will miss another payment due to the U.S. Treasury, just one week after its first-ever default on a payment for future retiree health benefits.

From April to June, losses totaled $5.2 billion, up $2.1 billion from the same period last year.

http://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2012/08/09/postal-service-reports-52b-loss-in-3rd-quarter

E-mail has killed 'em. I know this sounds liberal, but why is it that companies like UPS & Fed-ex charge ten times as much to mail a letter?

I suspect it is because the postal service doesn't charge enough to cover expenses. We still need the postal service.

Republicans in Congress engineered this train wreck. The 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act forced the USPS to pre-fund retiree benefits 75 years into the future, and to do so within 10 years. The law has drained the USPS of $20 billion since its enactment and is responsible for over 80% of its financial problems. This is an effort to privatize the Postal Service. When you're paying $4.00 to mail a letter via Fed Ex or UPS, remember to thank your Republican congressperson.

I have no use for the USPS. I have not used them for anything for a number of years and do not plan to in the future.

Admin wrote:

I have no use for the USPS. I have not used them for anything for a number of years and do not plan to in the future.

I don't usually send stuff via the USPS, but I get a lot of stuff from them.

EricEricson wrote:

I don't usually send stuff via the USPS, but I get a lot of stuff from them.

All I ever get is circulars, ads and campaign ads. Nothing of any importance ever comes to my mailbox, hell I go sometimes a week or so without even checking it.

Salinsky2012 wrote:

Republicans in Congress engineered this train wreck. The 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act forced the USPS to pre-fund retiree benefits 75 years into the future, and to do so within 10 years. The law has drained the USPS of $20 billion since its enactment and is responsible for over 80% of its financial problems. This is an effort to privatize the Postal Service. When you're paying $4.00 to mail a letter via Fed Ex or UPS, remember to thank your Republican congressperson.

seriously. you are rediculus. every damn thing is the republicans fault. But I know thats your schit SALINSKY

Postage Due? The U.S. Post Office has lost money for most of its 157 years. Recently, politicians have been laying much of the blame on the costs of carrying second-class mail, which includes magazines and newspapers. Last week President Truman himself teed off on magazine and newspaper publishers before an audience of postmasters, most of them political appointees. Harry Truman, who has joined Congress in asking raises for the mailmen despite the $500 million-a-year postal deficit, laid the "biggest part of the deficit" on the low rates on newspapers, magazines and advertising matter, a subsidy "to the tune of several hundred...


Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,935092,00.html#ixzz23Yn3LThc

its a really old problem...

I don't know which party is to blame for this, but it appears that Sal is barking up the right tree. I have read that the relatively new requirement for prepayment of retirement is unprecedented. Why they picked on the USPS, I dunno.

I read where they cannot make the current prepayment of something like $5B.

EricEricson wrote:

I don't know which party is to blame for this, but it appears that Sal is barking up the right tree. I have read that the relatively new requirement for prepayment of retirement is unprecedented. Why they picked on the USPS, I dunno.

I read where they cannot make the current prepayment of something like $5B.

The post office has never been a good profitable bussiness.

This pre payment law took effect in 2006, when congress was majority democrat.

I dont know who did it, maybe the pubs did.

However, when you think about gov employees retirement, it is a huge drain on us.

But the fact is, the USPS has always been broke. The article I posted was from 1951 and it was broke then.

and if we want to play politics with this, because weve all knew about this for a while. Why isnt that rule been abandoned by now?

I'll tell you why. Because none of our gov wants to do a damn thing unless its an election year. Every single crisis is held back until it can be used for a vote. Both sides.

Salinsky2012 wrote:

EricEricson wrote:

Why they picked on the USPS, I dunno.

Because UPS and FedEx have been lobbying for the privatization of the USPS for decades. I worked at UPS in the 80s, and they were having workshops on it then. It's finally paying off.

why shouldnt they have workhsops on them too? those companies are sucessful.

I dont see the problem with privatizing the mail to be honest. It would create real jobs. Not more gov jobs. gov jobs are not viable to the community. they just circulate taxes amongst themselves that come from other peoples non gov paid jobs. By privatizing it, that would create real inflow of tax revenue. and it would force companies to pay a little more for all that junk mail we keep getting. Or perhaps it would lessen that junk mail, which is fine for me, it would also save trees. I could go on and on about how much better it would be to privatize it.

I just sent a package Priority Mail (2-3 usual delivery), registered and insured.

When it did not come in three days....I called. The person on the other end was unintelligible. I kept asking her to slow down. She said it can take up to eleven days. In fifteen file a claim. No word on where the package was....just that it had been sitting in the departure city for two business days.

Of course the recipient was not home when the package was delivered. When the recipient went to pick it up, the package was not there, nor was it sent out for delivery. Fifteen minutes of phone calls. It was in another town. Did they want it to be redelivered. The recipient said absolutely not. She would retrieve it.

When she arrived at the station, they said, "Oh you are the one who they called about." The clerk disappeared for ten minutes. Only one clerk, the line started forming behind her. People getting frustrated.

The clerk finally shows and the package, now a week overdue and in the wrong location....was crushed. The clerk said, "That never happens."

The recipient indicated frustration over the pace of delivery approaching the speed of a solid and the clerk said...."We never lose registered mail. We get it to you eventually."

The recipient said that should be the USPS motto: We get it to you Eventually.

She also suggested that the handling of this high dollar package was exactly the clerk was unlikely to have a job in five years.

I am done going postal, lol.