Mailing ‘Passionate Letters’ and Other Congressional Suggestions for Saving the US Postal Service
**Written by Doug Powers
The US Postal Service is losing so much money that at first glance you’d think they gave up on mail delivery and went into the stimulus-backed solar panel business. The USPS is facing a $10 billion loss for the fiscal year. Additionally, thousands upon thousands of layoffs, or even a complete shutdown of the service, is looming.
As usual, caring members of Congress are there to help worsen the problem. Claire McCaskill has a marketing idea, while Joe Lieberman has an another suggestion:
In addition to structural reforms, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) suggested that USPS should mount a national advertising campaign promoting the value of printed mail.
“You cannot get money by text message,” McCaskill said. “I really think that there is a longing out there right now, especially in these uncertain times, for some of the things that have provided stability over the years.”
Donahoe said such a campaign is in the works. Aides said it will debut for the holiday shopping season.
Lieberman voiced his support, suggesting, “We should be writing more passionate letters to those we love.”
If McCaskill would have used the US Postal Service to physically mail the IRS her back taxes one penny at a time, she might have single-handedly saved the agency. And for Lieberman’s suggestion to work, somebody would need to transport Chris Matthews back to 2008, give him Barack Obama’s mailing address, a boatload of paper, envelopes and stamps, and disable his Internet access.
Jim Geraghty at NRO runs the numbers:
First, even the best advertising campaign isn’t going to generate enough new mail activity to generate enough revenue to offset losses in the billions. For example, to knock $1 billion off the current annual loss, the advertising campaign would have to spur Americans to buy 2,272,727,273 more stamps (2.2 billion) than they ordinarily would. In other words, if every man, woman, and child in America bought eight stamps, the Postal Service would shave off one-tenth of this year’s operating loss.
That’s how a private sector business would approach the math, but we’re talking about Washington, DC here. I think what McCaskill is getting at would be to have the government to “invest” billions in the Postal Service, with much of the money being used to create ad mailers that the USPS would them deliver to homes, and voilà — the finances of the Post Office would be rescued. Problem solved. Maybe we’ll hear about something like that in President Obama’s “jobs speech” Thursday evening.
**Written by Doug Powers
Twitter @ThePowersThatBe
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Obviously, passionately, writing a congressional member to quit spending money hasn’t haven’t this union bloated agency.
Obviously, passionately, writing a congressional member to quit spending money hasn’t
haven’thelped this union bloated agency.My dog ate my proofreader …
Since they won’t do the right thing – declare bankruptcy and break the union contract – I guess the only they can do is hold a bake sale…a really big bake sale.
If you could train him to eat the postman, that would be one less salary to pay. Train packs of dogs to do the same…well, we are on our way to the Postal Service’s solvency.
Let’s just train the dogs to deliver the mail. They’d get it done on time, be happy to see you, and probably understand the language you speak. (I live in CA. The mail-being comprehends about as well as the DMV-being.)
Yeah…but in Kalifornia, the dogs will still have to send their union dues in and the DMV will have to find someone who speaks Doberman and Chow.
Privatize it and let UPS, FedEx, etc. deliver mail along with packages. Every day mail is no longer necessary either. Most of my mail is junk anyway.
Oh like THIS ???
Once the Obama administration figures out how to save the USPS, they can get to work figuring out how to save the buggy whip manufacturers.
Think of the jobs they’ll save or create!
The words:
Pri
Vat
Ize
Either that, or remove the restrictions that prevent UPS/FedEx/DHL/etc from delivering first class mail and eliminate the USPS.
I’ll give you chow, but take my first hand experience: Dobermen speak two languages: english and bad english.
Now if you were referring to chihuahua, you’d have a point.
Kinda hard to imagine a postman-devouring chihuahua…
Trying to remember what is good about owning a chihuahua…oh yeah! If it is raining outside, you don’t have to take them for a walk. You just hold them out the window with one hand, then squeeze.
Just kidding…
Fine by me. USPS won’t let me carry in the post office. Kinkos will.
TXDPS trusts me. The FBI evidently does too. The USPS doesn’t.
let the post office close down and let fedx and ups deliver the mail
My husband has worked for the USPS for over 25 yrs. now as a inside clerk. He doesn’t get ‘free’ anything. He doesn’t get a bonus each yr. He doesn’t make $800 thousand a year. He PAYS for his medical, etc. So where did all the money go? Why are they SO broke? Too many hands in the cookie (pension) jar perhaps? I’m just PRAYIN’ he HAS a pension when he retires.
My father passed away a few weeks ago and I had to physically mail some papers to my sisters. Went in and asked for two stamps. didn’t even know the price of a stamp. When asked why I didn’t buy a book of stamps I told them this is the first piece of mail in almost two years. every bill, every statement all done electronically. Junk mail is the only thing delivered to our house. Take it out of the mail box and drop it in the recycle box just underneath. every two weeks, we put the box at the curb.
What is it going to cost the PO to deliver the cards advertising for us to spend more on stamps that I will just throw away?
Here’s my suggestion to save the US Snail. Everyone here get on every democrat mailing list. Then when they send you requests for donations send the empty, postage-paid envelopes back.
That oughta do it.
I’ve had a plan to save the postal service for some time, and this “what constitution?” administration is just the one to implement it.
BAN ALL TELEVISION POLITICAL ADS.
Force them to mail their message to the electorate.
It frees up the air waves for more infomercials, or whatever.
If you can’t read, or don’t have an address, you don’t make an informed vote — not really much different than now.
And the Obamanauts can get around that pesky Bill of Rights “right” to free speech, by ignoring it as they have with so much other speech (you can speak in school, but not to the extent that you bully anyone verbally, you can speak in public, but not if it’s “hate” speech, you can call a conservative a racist, but liberals can’t be called racists, … yadda, yadda, yadda)
How about replacing all of the low skilled (but very well compensated) positions with illegal aliens that are so near and dear to the hearts of Democrats? That would save billions on labor and benefits. We’ll get to see just how much solidarity there is among the unions for their little friends from south of the border. I can already feel the love.
One of the ladies at work used to be a postal carrier. She said she got out of it to save her sanity. She told me about how if you are on a certain type of route and do not get enough hours then you get paid based on the average amount of hours that the top 5 carriers have in that type of route. She said she did not make her hours once cause she was in the hospital. She expected to have a shorter paycheck, but low and behold she actually has a larger check. And she said that is just the tip of the iceberg.
Anthony Weiner would still have a job if he would’ve followed Joe’s advice….
I would like to see quite a bit more detail on USPS expenses (and a real audit). Are these losses from bloated pension payout (more union fluff) or what?
How much is this just crying to get a piece of the government handouts?
Resist we much.
Good one, a living, breathing squirt gun.
Bingo. Wait for it.
So when my company is mismanaged, I lose my shirt, close the doors and find another job. When the Gubment mismanages a business they get a bail out and keep mismanaging.
you had to go and remind me that old cow was from Missouri.
You forgot about the fact that a Chihuahua can always kill a much larger dog….as the larger dog chokes on the Chihuahua as it tries to swallow it whole.
This is a GREAT idea!! It reminded me of something I previously heard. When you get junk mail with business reply envelopes, stuff everything that does not include identifying info. on it into the business reply envelope and mail.
spaceycakes: Here’s hoping we can replace Claire in 2012.
(laughs)
Tell that to my cell phone bill!
At any rate, the Post Office needs to adapt, just like radio did in the 1950s and 60s when TV become available.
Of course, had we the Nanny State back then, we would have seen bailouts for the radio stations who would inevitably see their tens of millions listening base dwindle down, at least until surburbia became real and people needed something to get through rush hour traffic.
First, the excuse was e-mail. Then it was myspace, followed by facebook and now texting.
Folks, how many of you would take the time and money to write a letter and purchase a roll of stamps to write to 98% of the people on your cell phone contact list or social networking friends list?
That’s what I thought.
The Post Office is obsolete. They can deliver mail one day a week and no one would notice the difference. Real mail goes through UPS or FedEx.
Before you start bashing the Postal Service please get some facts straight.It is a quasi-government agency that has taken no tax money since the early 1980s. They are required to break even, not make a profit.Any changes in delivery must be approved by Congress. They are the only federal agency required to prefund retirees health benefits. An audit by the OIG revealed that the agency has overpaid by anywhere from 55 billion to 75 billion dollars. The payment is required to be made each September. They are only asking that the overage be applied to the payment. However I am sure Congress has spent that money. They cannot close post offices because communities go to their Congressman and complain. FedEx and UPS would never deliver “regular” mail because it is not profitable.The postal service delivers the “last mile” for FedEx and UPS everyday.We deliver to every address 6 days a week and more than one million new deliveries are added each year yet we are handling that with less employees. Yes I work for the postal service and take my responsibilities seriously of providing communications services for everyone. Not everyone has a computer or a cell phone and people in rural areas depend on the postal service. They do not want a bailout-They want Congress to do what’s right-If not for the payment that has to be made the Postal Service would be in the black. Are we a service or for a profit organization? The choice has to be made- If we are for profit then let us have the authority to make necessary changes.