
How Are Postmaster General Louis DeJoy's Changes Affecting Workers? - awnird
https://www.npr.org/2020/08/11/901219097/how-are-postmaster-general-dejoys-changes-affecting-workers
======
jimkleiber
I guess what confuses me is that, even assuming good intentions by the new
Postmaster General, why and why now?

I believe the main stated reason has been that the USPS loses money and they
want to make it break even or profitable. Assuming that's the reason (and not
election interference), why should such an infrastructure be breakeven or
profitable? And why now, during a pandemic?

There are plenty of government services that aren't even close to breakeven. I
imagine USPS actually might be one of the most self-sustaining federal
departments. Why should this particular one be profitable? Why should this one
be privatized, out of all of them?

The USPS has been one of the most stable, reliable, and predictable forces in
my life. Their informal creed speaks volumes to me: "Neither snow nor rain nor
heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of
their appointed rounds."

I'm open to hearing arguments for why the USPS should be profitable (or
privatized) and why now is a good time. I'm finding a very hard time imagining
why.

~~~
gok
Primary argument is that most of the entire rest of the world has moved to
profitable, privatized mail carrying.

~~~
jgacook
The USPS would be profitable if it didn't have to pre-fund its pension
obligations by an 75 years - an obligation no other government regulated
entity must abide by.

[https://www.nonprofitmailers.org/four-usps-
myths/](https://www.nonprofitmailers.org/four-usps-myths/)

~~~
missedthecue
The prepayment period ended in 2016. It is not to blame for current losses.

------
addicted
My spouse’s small business is seeing delays in deliveries the last few weeks
it didn’t even see at the height of the pandemic.

And she had something get lost a week ago, something that hadn’t happened in
over a year (small sample size though).

We do know that the local USPS has cut back on the hours their employees are
working, which is strange considering USPS is busier than ever.

~~~
rkhassen9
In the last two weeks, key financial docs got sent back as wrong address.
Charles Schwab and our bank - we only know because they called to ask us about
it. We’ve been at the same address for over 10 years. Never had this issue
before. Anecdotal, perhaps, but odd timing nonetheless.

------
yingw787
Funny little tidbit: my 1940s townhouse neighborhood has no universal front
desk and hands out building keys to USPS for each townhouse. The mailbox is
inside, and USPS is legally obligated to access it, so I know if USPS ships a
package for me it's next to my apartment door.

UPS and FedEx do not have access. You have to be there when they drop off the
package, or they're tossed into this hole (like a literal hole) next to the
door, or they do the "we missed you" thing and sticky a note to the outer door
and you pick it up in person.

I live a ten-minute drive away from the Pentagon. It's not just remote
villages in Alaska that'd be inconvenienced by USPS going away.

------
sircastor
I live in Oregon, where vote by mail is the standard. While I can drop off my
ballot at a drop box (convenient for folks in town, like me) it’s delivered by
USPS. This feels like a not-very-subtle attack on my voting franchise.

I’m a strong advocate for vote by mail, and it never occurred to me that the
USPS would not be there to handle ballot delivery and pickup.

I wonder if there are constitutional issues with this kind of change?

~~~
specialist
IIRC, Oregon requires postal ballots to be received by election day.

Also IIRC, Washington's (State) rule is received by certification, which is 21
(?) days after election day.

Changing to the Oregon rule is floated most every legislative session. We've
successfully beaten it back. But one thing I learned as an election integrity
activist is the Powers That Be will keep trying until they succeed.

FURTHER:

Back in the day, the Undeliverable As Addressed (UAA) rate was %1 for First
Class mail. Meaning %1 of postal ballots were not received by voters. And %1
of cast postal ballots never got back to central count. In my county, that's
over 10,000 ballots lost in a general election.

Anybody worried about USPS's performance should probably be doing their own
measuring of UAA and other metrics.

Any way. I'm _VERY CONCERNED_ about the USPS monkeying with stuff that ain't
broke. Ensuring postal balloting works as expected takes _A LOT_ of effort.

------
emodendroket
I don't know why anybody has to keep entertaining the absurd notion that
slowing delivery and making the service "not work" is not precisely the
purpose of the changes.

------
jgacook
Spare me the puerile libertarian arguments for a privatized postal service.
There is no good reason for it to be privatized and many Americans lives will
be negatively affected by such a change.

1) There are already private mail carriers (FedEx, UPS, et al.). They do not
have an obligation to deliver mail in a timely manner anywhere in the
continental US and overseas territories. This is fine if you are a city
dweller, but private mail carriers notoriously do not guarantee "last mile"
delivery. This will cut off many isolated rural communities for whom the USPS
is a lifeline to the outside world.

2) USPS receives no tax dollars for their services. They are completely self-
sustaining. A Republican congress forced an insane burden for the USPS to pre-
fund 75 years worth of pension obligations: there are future postal workers
who have not been born yet that the post office must plan pensions for. No
other government entity has such an obligation - this is the only reason the
USPS is in a financial problem and it is a manufactured crisis. There is no
"small government" argument here since your tax dollars don't fund them.

3) The USO pledge states that the USPS must offer affordable rates to
customers. Privatized companies have a market incentive to keep prices low,
yes, but in practice there is no way that there won't be price
collusion/fixing if a handful of private carriers become market dominant.
Antitrust is laughably weak in the US right now.

4) DeJoy is using the manufactured crisis from pension obligations as a canard
for slashing worker benefits and overpay to the bone. He is intentionally
gutting the USPS so the Republicans can point at it and whine about how
socialized enterprises don't work as well as private ones. This is why all
mail is so delayed right now: postal workers rely on overtime to ensure that
all mail is delivered in a timely manner.

~~~
mikem170
> A Republican congress forced an insane burden for the USPS to pre-fund 75
> years worth of pension obligations: there are future postal workers who have
> not been born yet that the post office must plan pensions for. No other
> government entity has such an obligation - this is the only reason the USPS
> is in a financial problem and it is a manufactured crisis.

This is the same obligation that private company pensions need to adhere to,
because that is the responsible thing to do, with the difference being that
the post office has to also fund retirement medical plans since, unlike a
private company, those are mandated by congress and can only be changed with
congressional approval.

I don't understand why this keeping getting called out, like it is an unusual
burden to be responsible. In my humble opinion I think that all government
pensions should be funded, because it is not fair for us to artificially lower
costs now and expect everyone's children and grandchildren in the future to
somehow pay for this generation's unfunded promises.

~~~
WarChortle18
> I don't understand why this keeping getting called out, like it is an
> unusual burden to be responsible.

They are being forced to plan for the next 75 years now. in 2006 They were
given 10 years to have the money needed for all pensions up to 75 years in the
future. That is an unreasonable burden because no company does that. No
company is planning 75 years from now on anything.

> In my humble opinion I think that all government pensions should be funded

No one is saying Pensions should stop being funded or paid out.

> because it is not fair for us to artificially lower costs now and expect
> everyone's children and grandchildren in the future to somehow pay for this
> generation's unfunded promises.

They are not artificially lowering costs, they were making a decent profit
without this burden at the current price point. They were more then capable of
meeting their obligations including pensions due now, and still making a
decent profit. Nothing was being pushed off to future generations.

~~~
mikem170
>They are being forced to plan for the next 75 years now.

I'm reading that ALL pensions offered by private companies in the U.S. must be
funded out for 75 years. I presume this is for good reason. Why should this
not apply to the USPS or other local/state/federal/church employees?

I might not follow your reply, but you seem to be under the impression that
the USPS is having to do something different than every private company, but
that does not appear to be the case.
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/2020/04/14/post-
office-p...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/2020/04/14/post-office-
pensions--some-key-myths-and-facts/)

EDIT: with the exception of medical coverage, which is handled differently
than private companies as per congress.

>in 2006 They were given 10 years to have the money needed for all pensions up
to 75 years in the future.

That would seem to have been a heavy burden. I don't know all the particulars,
but they seem to be past that now, right? Is this ten year catchup period
still relevant to the conversation?

>Nothing was being pushed off to future generations.

Then why does the government mandate this same pension funding for all private
company pensions? I assume it is because there were problems with bankrupt
pensions in the past.

------
scabbycakes
I imagine Trump's installed someone in charge of the USPS to destabilize it in
a hurry in order to erode confidence in the USPS to be able to handle mail-in
voting.

Perhaps he'll get the public behind him enough to somehow stop mail-in voting
if the next few months the mail system falls apart. Or if not and he loses the
election, he'll blame it on the incompetent mail service and demand an
election redo or whatever Trumpy things he normally does when he loses.

It seems to me that it's everything to do with the election, nothing to do
with improving the USPS.

------
SpikeDad
Just like you'd think a Trump sycophant would implement. Reducing services,
removing equipment and cutting back on employee hours.

Mail is piling up in Iowa (where the person being interviewed is located) and
from other reports all over the country.

Well maybe not in Texas or Florida where Trump depends on vote by mail.

Of course it all started as revenge against Amazon but it's nicely
transitioned to manipulating the USPS for political benefits. In other words,
business as usual.

~~~
benbenolson
Any proof that these changes wouldn't affect Texas and Florida USPS services,
or that any of these changes are for political benefit?

~~~
redindian75
He tweeted. He tweeted that mail-in voting is GOOD in Florida, and somehow
totally different from mail-in voting in other states. He encouraged people to
do vote by mail in Florida.

------
jmcguckin
The USPS loses a lot of money. Even ignoring the pension pre-funding issue,
it's still cashflow negative. For a supposedly 'private' company that
constantly requires bailing out by the US government. The USPS is just another
industry that the internet has decimated and mostly replaced. First class mail
has fallen so much that only package delivery and junk mail is keeping the
USPS (kinda) alive.

One of the Postal Services problems is that senior management comes from USPS
career employees whose loyalty is to the postal service employees - not the
business itself or even its customers. The USPS needs new blood at the top and
it needs to start acting like a for-profit business and less like a business
that has been captured by its union.

~~~
jgacook
> The USPS loses a lot of money. Even ignoring the pension pre-funding issue,
> it's still cashflow negative.

This is untrue - without its pension pre-funding requirement it turns a modest
profit each year[1].

[1] [https://www.nonprofitmailers.org/four-usps-
myths/](https://www.nonprofitmailers.org/four-usps-myths/)

~~~
emodendroket
Even if this were not true, it seems to me that a mail system is a societal
good that is significant enough that I would be happy to see it funded from
taxes.

------
Shivetya
Practically a paid advertisement by the Postal Employees Union. Okay, not
practically, completely.

Having had two relatives both be Post Masters you can damn well bet the slow
down of mail is totally because they are purposefully doing it and not for
hours cut. You underestimate the levels they go to. Both relatives recounted
days where you would have bickering constantly and having to call in RCAs
because two or more permanent employees were bitching over a truck or
additions to a route and no mail would go out.

This same union had incredible influence over the poor working conditions RCA
drivers suffer; these are all those personal vehicles marked up with PO logos
and such. All with their guaranteed day but hoping for enough days to pay
their bills. All having to suffer the whims of a regular PO employees who
treat most of them like dirt. All this just so they can get their permanent
position. Which should be done by the RCA with most seniority but this can be
sabotaged quite easily by the regulars.

Sorry, this piece is election year drivel and you can expect story after story
on every subject sure to come up in ads

~~~
djaque
> Both relatives recounted days...

The plural of anecdote is not data. Do you have anything solid to back up your
claim that it is the postal union slowing down the mail service as a political
move?

That's a bold statement and requires some strong evidence for me to believe
it.

