Posted on 08/25/2009 12:49:20 PM PDT by Sub-Driver
U.S. Postal Service Offering 30,000 Workers Buyout
SAN FRANCISCO -- The U.S. Postal Service said Tuesday that it will offer buyouts to 30,000 workers, or about 4.5% of its workforce, in an effort to cut costs. The one-time offer is expected to save USPS as much as $500 million next year. The agency said the buyouts are part of an effort to cut $6 billion in annual costs.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxbusiness.com ...
Creating or saving..........
Buyouts.... Does that mean 30,000 more unemployed?
Oops.
Why not just lay them off like a real business would?
30,000 fewer postal workers. How ever could we tell?
The same reason the carrier at my old job threw one hell of a fit in the lobby because the bldg mgr placed our box “too low to the floor” and she had to bend over or squat down to reach it.
UNIONS.
Do we really need six days of mail delivery?
Really?
I think we could easily bet by with three or four, if we also raise the bulk rate for all the crap that comes along with legitemate mail. I receive about three letters or importanet pieces of mail a week (personally).
Cut out Saturday and Wednesday delivery and I think they’d do OK.
If govt can’t run something as cut and dried as the post office without losing billions, how can we expect them to successfully run the health care industry?
From the very beginning of the Republic, the Post Office was an important source of political patronage. Hard to imagine that this has changed much.
you got that right.
I won’t work, because they will have to stand and line at the post office to get their money and who is crazy enough to agree to that??
Only a fool would take a buyout in this economy. They’ll burn through their buyout funds before they find another job.
my office is on the top of the stairs of an office building. Our mail carrier just leaves all of our mail lying on the bottom step every day, unlike FedEx and UPS that brings up their packages to my office.
Have you called your post master? Raise hell, get things done your way.
Agreed.
I think it may be the single largest employer of black women in the US.
Now, I’ve got nothing about black women having jobs, but it seems the USPS has an unusually high concentration.
Just sayin’.
Understand, if there weren't the concerted effort to crash the economy, the PO would be doing far better and we would be engaging in the, what, twentieth PO bashing thread this summer?
“Why not just lay them off like a real business would?”
probably unions wont let them
Now, you're just getting all wee-weed up.
I'm not certain but I think these govt-affiliated entitites only make buyout offers to people who are eligible for retirement.
buyouts for govt. hacks?
That’s our money. Fire the 30,000 and be done with it.
It is time to “Privatize” the USPS. Sell it off along with Freddie and Fannie...
don’t feel too bad for them....they’ll get sweet deals, probably nice gummit pensions...
At least Saturday, since Zero said, look at UPS and FedEx, and I think they don't do squat on Saturdays, unless its a scant overnight business for Saturday delivery.
See Tagline.
That and the IRS. Just sayin’
Makes ya wonder about Obama’s point about the Post Office, doesn’t it?????
Scrap prior answer. Article on my cable home page says some people will be able to quit even though ineligible for retirement.
I doubt they will get many takers in this economy. 15K isnt much given the risk involved with quitting a job that is otherwise secure if you have decent seniority. No unemployment if you quit, right?
If they allowed private companies (e.g. FedEx, UPS) to compete and deliver first class mail, the US Postal Service would be out of business in six months or less.
The local PO in the Prudential Center of Boston is now one of the slowest, poorly run I have ever seen.
This place was once fast and efficient with 13 people working at all times and open till 7:00 PM.
Now, there are about 5 people on, never enough clerks ( at times one clerk working the counter ) and every day there is a huge line. I do a lot of shipping - and every day these is a line. I really do feel bad for the folks who work there. Good group of people but they are really up a creek without a paddle.
Oh yes...they now close at 5:30. What a disaster.
These 30,000 are probable eligible for retirement already.
The street names don't even sound the same. Some of the mail is addressed to my street but its a different number and name.
I've seen plenty of checks arrive here, the next door neighbor had a certified letter left on the doorstop, even had tax documents arrive here for an address about 5 blocks away. Business name on the letter, three digit address and the street sounds nothing like mine.
I walked those tax documents over to the business - I thought the man they were addressed to was going to hug me!
We need 6 days for Netflix! I could use 7. . .LOL.
I need 7. I receive at least one useful piece of mail every day.
FedEx and UPS don’t have the infrastructure to even try. The move fewer parcels in a year than USPS moves in a week, really they barely even make one days worth of USPS production. If they had to deal with that volume they’d implode.
That’s exactly right. After 6 years of employment, there is a guaranteed no layoff clause that comes into effect. I think the only employees who will take the buyout are those eligible or very close to retirement.
Sure.
How about a $1 general postage stamp?
Cuz that’s where we’re going if we don’t fix this thing.
yikes! That’s one of the reasons I never intend to order some of those merchandise found in the back of magazines labeled “discreetly delivered to your door”
I don’t really think there’s anything to fix. People don’t recognize the scale of what the USPS does. They delivered, with an extremely high level of accuracy, 202 billion parcels last year, and in the process they lost a mere 7 billion dollars, or 28 cents per parcel. And it’s not like parts of the government should be turning a profit anyway, when the government is doing it profit is over charging.
I’ve long said that the USPS is one of the best, if not THE best, in the world.
But, if a government service that charges a fee isn’t breakig even, IT’S BROKE.
Might as well make it FREE and just write the whole thing off?
Streamline the USPS.
Either raise the prices or cut the services until they break even. If they raise the prices, there will be more pressure to modernize and revamp their “business” model.
Accepting that a specific service like the post office will always lose money is a non-starter.
Sorry I think it’s exactly the opposite, the government (and all of it’s parts) should always run at a deficit. Not the huge deficits we’ve seen the last few decades, but always some. Because the government never has its own money, if it’s ever running at any level of profit (and really those are your choices, you never really work the math to be exactly 0) it’s taking extra, the government should never take extra.
They raise the price, every year now. That doesn’t seem to be applying any of the pressure you’re talking about. Of course the reality is that they are very modernized. Most mail goes through most of its life with very little human contact, it gets picked up by a person, chucked into machinery that reads the handwriting adds a barcode which gets read by all further machines in the sorting and moving process where it eventually winds up in a truck where a person puts it in your box. You really can’t get much more modern than that. If you add the price of the stamp and the overages the USPS can get a letter from a house in LA to a house in NYC in two days for under 75 cents in TOTAL cost. How is this really a bad thing?
ALL specific government services SHOULD lose money at ALL times. Do you want the military turning a profit? Highway department? The police? I think you made a blanket statement that you didn’t think through. The idea of self sustaining government services is frankly laughable, except for the parts where it’s inviting tyranny.
It only encourages over-use, as with anything that’s “free”.
Even if you pay for the stamp, part of that deliver is free and is extracted from taxpayers.
Maybe keep general postage level, but the bulk rates are what drives all the crap mail you get six days a week. Raise the bulk rates and you’ll see both a rise in revenue and a decrease in that crap.
I agree - no profit.
I never said anywhere that they should turn a profit.
But, allowing them to continually lose money just guarantees that an uncompetitive entity remains in business. As long as that happens, we’ll never have a serious alternative to the USPS. If government profits are bad, what are government MONOPOLIES?
They should make EVERY ATTEMPT to come as close to breaking even as possible.
Advocating a specific service that always loses money is a solid example of “not thinking it through”.
Only $5 1/2 billion to go.
There’s no such thing as over use. The USPS is in the Constitution as a vital service of the government, it’s how we’re supposed to doing stuff.
During the only time period in American history when USPS was profitable (mid 90s) bulk mail is what put them over the top.
You’re never going to hit exactly 0. You’re either going to turn a profit (hopefully small) or run a deficit (again, hopefully small). There’s too much random stuff over the year to hit 0.
They really aren’t uncompetitive. Again compare the sheer volume of what USPS does, and the total cost. FedEx and UPS can’t come close to what USPS does in any way you slice it. They can’t handle 202 billion parcels a year, they can’t two day an item coast to coast for 75 cents, they simply can’t do it.
A - the USPS isn’t a monopoly, the fact that we can all list off competition proves that. B - this “monopoly” is specifically called to exist in the Constitution.
I didn’t advocate a specific service. I said ALL parts of the government should ALWAYS run in small deficit. I thought it through just fine, you just aren’t paying attention.
There’s definitely over-use in the USPS.
Bulk mail senders get a huge break over general postage customers. That accounts for a significant portion in both piece and weight.
As long as somebody else is picking up the slack (the deficits), there’s no incentive to make the mail pay for itself.
When I say “specific service”, I’m not referring to any agency or branch of the government, I’m referring to the “specific service” provided when somebody pays a specific fee for a specific performance. When you pay for your lawn to be mowed, you’re paying for a “specific service” because you’re paying for the mowing of YOUR lawn. When you pay for a stamp, you’re paying for YOUR mail to be delivered. As such, the neighborhood kid shouldn’t go next door and try to collect the deficit from your neighbor.
And, by legal definition, they’re uncompetitive.
FedEx and UPS cannot compete, legally, on “general mail” deliveries. They wrote it into law to specifically limit competition.
The are, indeed, a monopoly because of the legal exclusions against competition. Now, go read your Constitution (I have my pocket copy, courtesy of the CATO institute, right here). Reference where it says ONLY the government can operate a postal system. I’ll wait ;)
Back so soon?
So, when you reference The Constitution, that’s where you really need to PAY ATTENTION.
Sorry but there’s no such thing as over use of the USPS, it’s OUR service. Yes bulk mailers do get a discount, because to get bulk mail rates you have to do significant portions of the work for the post office, including bringing it in yourself and pre-sorting.
Funny you say there’s no incentive to make the mail pay for itself on a thread that exists on the news that the USPS is cutting 6 billion dollars worth of cost. There seems to be a lot of effort, fairly constant, to reduce their deficit.
FedEx and UPS couldn’t compete anyway. Again, coast to coast, 2 days, 75 cents TOTAL cost (stamp plus budget overage divided by volume). FedEx and UPS couldn’t pull that off. Then there’s the sheer volume, UPS handles 13 million parcels a day, USPS handles 500 million. None of the competition has anywhere near the infrastructure to compete with USPS. And finally there’s the privacy matter, people don’t want 3 companies poking into their mailbox every day.
I never said the Constitution says only, don’t lie about what I said. I said the USPS is in the Constitution, Article I Section 8.
The PO is a quaint govt run organization (and union run) - what’s not to like? Sarc/
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