Postal Service posts $8.5 billion loss

[firstdown]

Originally Posted by Mattyk

I pay for garbage removal, therefore I'm paying to toss it out.

I thought that's what you where saying but trash service will not drop its prices if junk mail stopped. Actually if junk mail stopped it would cost you money in postage because junk mail must pay a good chunk of the Postal income.

[MTK]

Thanks but I still hate junk mail. It's a waste of my time and a waste of paper. I rarely use the USPS so another rate hike wouldn't bother me.

[firstdown]

Originally Posted by Mattyk

Thanks but I still hate junk mail. It's a waste of my time and a waste of paper. I rarely use the USPS so another rate hike wouldn't bother me.

I don't mail much personally but my business does. I try to fax, email, set customers up on ebill, but there is still a large % who don't like that and want a bill. Hell I get 5 to 10 people who come into my office to pay their bill by check and then want a receipt. That I don't get. I can give people a 15% discount off their auto ins. if they do automatic withdraw and ebill and only about 40% of the people will sign up for that.

[ArtMonkDrillz]

Originally Posted by firstdown

I don't mail much personally but my business does. I try to fax, email, set customers up on ebill, but there is still a large % who don't like that and want a bill. Hell I get 5 to 10 people who come into my office to pay their bill by check and then want a receipt. That I don't get. I can give people a 15% discount off their auto ins. if they do automatic withdraw and ebill and only about 40% of the people will sign up for that.

Some companies are still weird about paying online. I pay all of my bills online now except for my water bill because those F'ers charge me a $3 service fee for anything other than a mailed check.
So I could pay $3 every month for my $13 water bill or I could pay $.044. Um, tough choice.

[KLHJ2]

Originally Posted by firstdown

I don't mail much personally but my business does. I try to fax, email, set customers up on ebill, but there is still a large % who don't like that and want a bill. Hell I get 5 to 10 people who come into my office to pay their bill by check and then want a receipt. That I don't get. I can give people a 15% discount off their auto ins. if they do automatic withdraw and ebill and only about 40% of the people will sign up for that.

Wait, you sell insurance? It must be nice to work in a business in which the government forces people to use.

[firstdown]

Originally Posted by Angry

Wait, you sell insurance? It must be nice to work in a business in which the government forces people to use.

It would be just fine with me if the government stopped forcing people to purchase auto ins. Thats just a small % of what we sell and my house hold make up here is the 35 to 45 year old couples with 1.7 kids with incomes around $150,000 plus. Most of them purchase ins. to protect their assets and not because they are forced to buy ins. If that was the case they would just buy the minimum coverage and not increase their coverages. If I wanted government help I'd be for more regulations which drives up the prices and my commissions. Good example of that is New Jersey and New York. I've had customers move from NY to Va. and save $4,000 just on their auto ins. If Va was regulated like NY that would be another 4 grand I would get paid commission on. To be fair some of that is higher labor cost but allot has to do with heavy regulations.

Also the state of Va. does not force anyone to purchase auto ins. If you don't want to buy ins you just have to pay DMV the $500 and your good to go.

[CRedskinsRule]

I probably am being hypocritical on this, but really... 8.5billion in the red to keep mail service available to every address in the US. Maybe it should get the ax, but anyone who tried SS's NYTimes budget balancing thing realizes that 8.5Billion don't mean squat in the scheme of things. If we get Defense, SocialSec, Medicare, etc down to where 8.5billion balances the budget, then hack it, hack it to pieces. Until then, cutting it can be looked at 2 ways, 1- a meaningless throwaway that politicians can use for campaign fluff, or 2- a creation of a hardship on people in rural areas for a function that government has been tasked with since the 1800's to allow for politicians to get their pet projects funded

[firstdown]

Originally Posted by CRedskinsRule

I probably am being hypocritical on this, but really... 8.5billion in the red to keep mail service available to every address in the US. Maybe it should get the ax, but anyone who tried SS's NYTimes budget balancing thing realizes that 8.5Billion don't mean squat in the scheme of things. If we get Defense, SocialSec, Medicare, etc down to where 8.5billion balances the budget, then hack it, hack it to pieces. Until then, cutting it can be looked at 2 ways, 1- a meaningless throwaway that politicians can use for campaign fluff, or 2- a creation of a hardship on people in rural areas for a function that government has been tasked with since the 1800's to allow for politicians to get their pet projects funded

That's the thinking we need to get away from. I feel if we start getting every federal employee or person working for the goverment to find ways to save $100 here and $100 there then we start to make a dent in this problem. Its not always the other persons waisted money that's the problem. Its time for everyone to watch what they spend.

[CRedskinsRule]

Originally Posted by firstdown

That's the thinking we need to get away from. I feel if we start getting every federal employee or person working for the goverment to find ways to save $100 here and $100 there then we start to make a dent in this problem. Its not always the other persons waisted money that's the problem. Its time for everyone to watch what they spend.

Our governments issues is not the nickel and dime type problems. It is the approx 66% of the "non discretionary" spending that will solve the problems. I am sorry, but 100 here or 100 there doesn't cut it.

The solution, at least for "rational" people is not to cut the legitimate and long standing processes of government, but to cut the overgrown monstrosity that it has become.

Should the post office do what it can to run at a 0 net loss, sure, but don't let saving those few billion detract from what should be the bigger goal of getting the government back under control.

[firstdown]

Originally Posted by CRedskinsRule

Our governments issues is not the nickel and dime type problems. It is the approx 66% of the "non discretionary" spending that will solve the problems. I am sorry, but 100 here or 100 there doesn't cut it.

The solution, at least for "rational" people is not to cut the legitimate and long standing processes of government, but to cut the overgrown monstrosity that it has become.

Should the post office do what it can to run at a 0 net loss, sure, but don't let saving those few billion detract from what should be the bigger goal of getting the government back under control.

I'd say that what started the problem and its the real way to start and fix the problem. Look at the people here that are saying that 8.6 billions is no big deal in the larger picture. See if you teach people how to not waist $100 then its much easier to teach them how not to waist $1000, $100,000 , 1,000,000,0000, etc.... Any business person know when you need to cut cost you start with the easy smaller cuts and work your way up.

[CRedskinsRule]

Originally Posted by firstdown

I'd say that what started the problem and its the real way to start and fix the problem. Look at the people here that are saying that 8.6 billions is no big deal in the larger picture. See if you teach people how to not waist $100 then its much easier to teach them how not to waist $1000, $100,000 , 1,000,000,0000, etc.... Any business person know when you need to cut cost you start with the easy smaller cuts and work your way up.

What started the problem, was when citizens (poor and rich) start looking to the government for handouts. And even more so, when our government, and the people by extension, decided to get caught up in foreign entanglements. I understand your thought process, but you are letting the numbers cloud your process.
Currently the national debt is:
$ 1 3 , 7 9 6 , 1 8 6 , 8 8 8 , 5 2 5 . 0 6
post office loss
$ 0 0 , 0 0 8 , 5 0 0 , 0 0 0 , 0 0 0

putting this in perspective: if a company is running a $14,000 dollar debt, and you go to the owner and say our telemarketing unit lost $8.50 last year, Chances are the owner will say "well see what you can do." and focus on the retirement plan that is running $3000 in debt or the transportation and security concerns that are running $4500 in debt.

[MTK]

good points CR, makes perfect sense to me.

[firstdown]

Look I'm just using your example and I know our biggest issues are SS/medicare and the military. Any business that has spending problems need to start from the bottom and work up is all I'm saying. We can stick a bandaid on this by increasing SS ben. to 67, cut medicare etc... but we are not fixing the problem of spending we are just ****ing people out of their retirement that the government took from them. Or we can start to make the tough decisions from the bottom and get government under control so we don't have to keep patching things together.

As we discuss this government agencies are on a spending spree so they can spend their entire budget by the end of the year even if they don't need to spend. That so they don't loose that money next year but why fix that those stupid items only cost a $100 here and a $1,000 there. Same think as to why fix the Post Office its only 8.6 billion and not the real problem. I guess we should also keep earmarks because they account for less then 1% of spending.

[CRedskinsRule]

Originally Posted by firstdown

Look I'm just using your example and I know our biggest issues are SS/medicare and the military. Any business that has spending problems need to start from the bottom and work up is all I'm saying. We can stick a bandaid on this by increasing SS ben. to 67, cut medicare etc... but we are not fixing the problem of spending we are just ****ing people out of their retirement that the government took from them. Or we can start to make the tough decisions from the bottom and get government under control so we don't have to keep patching things together.

As we discuss this government agencies are on a spending spree so they can spend their entire budget by the end of the year even if they don't need to spend. That so they don't loose that money next year but why fix that those stupid items only cost a $100 here and a $1,000 there. Same think as to why fix the Post Office its only 8.6 billion and not the real problem. I guess we should also keep earmarks because they account for less then 1% of spending.

k.
as i have said multiple times. If someone shows a legitimate plan to bring the govt back under control, and that plan includes(but doesn't rely on) hacking the post office, fine hack away. But if some politician is going to try to sell me a bill of goods that he did something to reduce the govt because he got rid of the US Post Office then he/she can kiss my heinie.

I agree with one thing you wrote, we need to stop trying to patchwork it.

We need politicians who have the intestinal fortitude to take a look at things from scratch, and say this is what we need to do, these are our priorities, and this is what we need to do to have a functioning, fiscally responsible govt that meets the requirements and duties as outlined in the constitution.

This all makes me think of the constitutional convention. Can you imagine, just a few years after the country was created, they got together, rather than going to war against each other, and agreed to scrap the old plan entirely, and start new and from scratch! That was radical

I am not saying that we need a constitutional convention, but we do need to throw out the old ways and get serious about having a functional fiscally responsible government

[firstdown]

Originally Posted by CRedskinsRule

k.
as i have said multiple times. If someone shows a legitimate plan to bring the govt back under control, and that plan includes(but doesn't rely on) hacking the post office, fine hack away. But if some politician is going to try to sell me a bill of goods that he did something to reduce the govt because he got rid of the US Post Office then he/she can kiss my heinie.

I agree with one thing you wrote, we need to stop trying to patchwork it.

We need politicians who have the intestinal fortitude to take a look at things from scratch, and say this is what we need to do, these are our priorities, and this is what we need to do to have a functioning, fiscally responsible govt that meets the requirements and duties as outlined in the constitution.

This all makes me think of the constitutional convention. Can you imagine, just a few years after the country was created, they got together, rather than going to war against each other, and agreed to scrap the old plan entirely, and start new and from scratch! That was radical

I am not saying that we need a constitutional convention, but we do need to throw out the old ways and get serious about having a functional fiscally responsible government

I pretty much agree with you.

The actual reason I started this thread was to point out another failing government function.