Comments on: USPS ending saturday letter delivery

By: C W

C W — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 18:42:00 +0000

You really have no clue what you’re talking about.

By: C W

C W — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 18:39:00 +0000

Except again that this is the GOP plan to privatize and destroy the USPS. They would have been fine if not for the pension chicanery.

By: skyhawk1

skyhawk1 — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 01:48:00 +0000

GOP douchery to destroy what is still a better deal than UPS or Fed-Ex. It is not tax payer funded. People need to get smarter.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 00:22:00 +0000

You are presumably alluding to the fact that junk mail subsidizes ‘the rest’.

Is that true? I had the impression that the USPS subsidizes junk mail by offering absurdly low rates for it.

By: chgoliz

chgoliz — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 23:59:00 +0000

And that was before trains even, when nothing went faster than a horse.

When the Brits get something right, they really get it right.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 23:34:00 +0000

There’s a mention of next-day delivery to a distant part of the country in one of (I think) Jane Austen’s novels.

By: scolbath

scolbath — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 22:27:00 +0000

You are presumably alluding to the fact that junk mail subsidizes ‘the rest’. But I believe the financial difficulties of the post office indicate that isn’t a winning strategy at this time. It’s physical spam.

By: AnthonyC

AnthonyC — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 22:05:00 +0000

I believe you are mistaken about what pays for what.

By: chgoliz

chgoliz — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 20:29:00 +0000

When I lived in London in the mid-1980′s, there were two postal deliveries a day, and if you reacted quickly enough to the first post and got your response to the post box at the end of the street within an hour or two, your response would be delivered in the second post that day (anywhere in London).

By: chgoliz

chgoliz — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 20:25:00 +0000

Exactly. How this continues to be the law — as if it were part of the Bill of Rights or something — is inexplicable. Especially when one considers franking: imagine if all the politicians in Washington started to have to pay private for-profit companies to send their required mailings to their constituents. Are they really all that short-sighted? (Yeah, I know…..)

By: Mike Hathaway

Mike Hathaway — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:33:00 +0000

They should keep saturday and dump monday and tuesday. or maybe tuesday and thursday. The government screwing with the post office is what is killing it. They are also banned from trying to get in on any other type businesses. Postal workers visit every house in the country on a regular basis there are so many other paid services they could offer. Imagine paying for a postal worker to knock on the door and check on a elderly relative once a week. Reading utility meters that are not reporting in properly. What really kind of bugs me is the whole 3 or 4 fossil fuel powered vehicles rolling through my neighborhood every day. Post office, UPS, Fed Ex, and some other generic express service.

By: scolbath

scolbath — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:17:00 +0000

They could easily supply postal service to people in rural areas if they had a business model that didn’t involve carpetbombing the rest of the country with “Weekly Shopper” adverts.

By: Brainspore

Brainspore — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:15:00 +0000

People like to complain about costs but our postage delivery rates are actually pretty low compared to comparable countries. For example, sending a letter within Australia (a country of approximately the same size as the contiguous U.S.) costs about 20 cents more than it does here.

By: Boundegar

Boundegar — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:03:00 +0000

And to hell with people in rural areas, and people who can’t afford internet access.

By: Boundegar

Boundegar — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:02:00 +0000

Giving them a living wage and medical insurance.

By: แอ็ะปปี้

แอ็ะปปี้ — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 17:16:00 +0000

This is only the first step. They’re not stopping until it’s privatized, they’re raking in the cash, and everyone is screwed. Rural delivery?!?!? Haha! Not profitable.

By: แอ็ะปปี้

แอ็ะปปี้ — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 17:14:00 +0000

This is such a charade. Please, nobody fall for it. The USPS is not broke; this is just a scam to privatize their union. No reason for this, absolutely none. A 2006 law forcing it to fully set aside 75 years of pensions (ie FOR PEOPLE NOT BORN YET) within ten years is almost entirely the cause of its financial woes. Yes changing times mean it should find new ways to raise revenue, but Congress isn’t allowing any options besides “privatize it”.

It’s a scam. Raise bloody hell over this.
http://nalc.org/news/latest/2013_02_06-donahoe.html

By: relawson

relawson — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 17:14:00 +0000

I wonder if this trick will work for saturday delivery http://consumerist.com/2011/10/18/the-styrofoam-cube-in-this-letter-serves-a-bureaucratic-purpose/

By: แอ็ะปปี้

แอ็ะปปี้ — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 17:09:00 +0000

Yeah, it’s hard to fund pensions 75 years in advance. That’s why NOBODY DOES THAT. Except the USPS. Because of a 2006 law. Designed to bankrupt them and open the door to privatization.

By: scolbath

scolbath — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:58:00 +0000

Although this is the most commonly cited reason for the Post Office’s woes, I think it’s hardly the root of the matter. If things had gone the other way, and the Post Office was in trouble, people would complain that they had defaulted on their retirement obligations just like the…. well, any of the companies that have gone bankrupt in the past 8 years did.

The problem is that no one really wants what the Post Office is selling any more. 90% of what the Post Office delivers is unmitigated crap that you can’t get away from. Even bills are delivered electronically. They can’t survive on Mother’s Day cards, Ebay, and Netflix any more.

By: awjt

awjt — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:52:00 +0000

It’s even cold there first.

By: awjt

awjt — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:51:00 +0000

Yes, make the jerks all have to hand-deliver their bills to me! I’m tired of paying them! No I will not hand-deliver my checks back. Rot in hell, massive corporations.

By: CrackWilding

CrackWilding — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:46:00 +0000

Yeah! Screw those people and their pensions! Why can’t they live on cat food like the rest of us?!

By: fuzzbo

fuzzbo — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:44:00 +0000

I think you should leave the partisan crap at the door and maybe take a look at why the USPS has to pre-fund those pensions. Whose bright idea was that? Who stands to benefit from a privatized postal system?

By: CrackWilding

CrackWilding — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:44:00 +0000

Yes, because what in this world is worse than low-skilled laborers having the opportunity to act collectively?

By: darren_gough

darren_gough — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:34:00 +0000

It’s the same in many countries around the world.

By: jimdigritz

jimdigritz — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:32:00 +0000

Well, there’s always a silver lining….

By: jimdigritz

jimdigritz — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:31:00 +0000

FFS leave the partisan crap at the door.

The truth is that the USPS is (just like the UK’s Royal Mail) is simply not fit for purpose.

If you are happy to be stiffed for a massive taxpayer bailout of teamster strongarmed pensions which CAN NEVER be funded through normal business operations then go ahead.

By: Peter

Peter — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:26:00 +0000

I live in Canada, I think I was well into my teens before I first learned that the US actually DID Saturday delivery.

I just thought “you only get mail on Mon-Fri” was a standard thing (aside from special, more costlier delivery systems).

By: franko

franko — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:24:00 +0000

like with the penny, and health care, once again Canuckistan is ahead of the U.S.