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Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

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Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#101

Post by lotsofpulp »

enraged_camel wrote: post #91
lotsofpulp wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Retirement benefits should be funded as they are accrued. That is not the problem. The problem is the USPS doesn’t have the power to price their products appropriately in order to pay for their expenses (including payroll which includes retirement benefits). If anything, all entities promising retirement benefits should be forced to do it the way USPS does. In fact, non government entities were forced to via the Pens…

>> Retirement benefits should be funded as they are accrued. That is not the problem. No, that really is the problem. Prefunding pension liabilities is something that literally no company or federal agency ever does, for obvious reasons.

I don’t know what this “prefunding” word means, but the USPS was only required to save for accrued benefits. Which every non governmental entity is required to do in the US due to ERISA and PPA 2006.

https://www.cnbc.com/2011/10/24/the-truth-about-the-post-off...

> Although accounting rules require the postal service to calculate future liabilities, including those for projected future employees, the law only requires pre-funding of obligations to actual current and past employees

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#102

Post by cmurf »

gray_-_wolf wrote: post #4

Are there some actual studies stating that privatized mail office would be cheaper/more efficient/better service? Or is this just attempt at money grab?

Deutsche Post. The problem is that the U.S. is full of bad ideas everywhere you look and most Americans just don't care. Republicans sabotage the public institutions to make them look bad so they can say government is bad/incompentent. And when things are privately held they demand no regulations because regulations are bad/incompetent/expensive to business. At least where there are examples of successful privatization, there's strong anti-fraud and competition laws. The U.S. also used to do that, but now hate on government, insist it is inherently incompetent and cannot ever be fixed, while deifying billionaires. Aristocracy is inherently incompatible with democracy, and by default the aristocrats win. The only non-violent way to beat them is free and fair elections.

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#103

Post by qserasera »

nemothekid wrote: post #10

Incredibly frustrating to get mail by USPS over the past couple months and even more frustrating to know this is an intentional kneecapping of the USPS by the administration in order "prove" government services are inefficient to privatize the USPS

I agree that this was a kneecapping and completely disagree that we need to privatize the USPS. Current administration has gained the ability to raise the price for packages coming in from China[1] and it has tried to charge Amazon more using USPS by witholding a federal 10 billion loan[2]. There are many more instances that reliably indicate the USPS recieves consistent hostility from the federal government.

[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/25/postal-compromise-close-as-u...

[2] https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/trump-postal-service-cha...

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#104

Post by missedthecue »

tehjoker wrote: post #71
gray_-_wolf wrote: post #4

Are there some actual studies stating that privatized mail office would be cheaper/more efficient/better service? Or is this just attempt at money grab?

Given equal technology, private services can only be cheaper if they exploit their workers harder, after all they have to make a profit so the difference has to come from somewhere. They could potentially offer better service by addressing certain niches that a broader service would be less suited to address, which partially explains UPS, FedEx, DHL etc. Privatizing government services is a money grab nearly 100% of…

Why does the UPS pay better than the post office if they only exist through the "exploitation" of their workforce?

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#105

Post by dragonwriter »

jrobn wrote: post #66
dragonwriter wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It’s not about privatizing the service, Yes it is. > it’s about disrupting their ability to process mail in ballots for the election. True, but those are complementary not mutually exclsuive motivations.

That’s like saying genocide is ok because we need to decrease our population. They are mutual exclusive motivations.

No, I'm saying that both causing the postal service to fail to politically justify full privatization and interfering with mail-in voting for perceived benefit in the immediate upcoming election are actual motivations of the policies being implemented by the executive branch that impede USPS function.

I don't think either of those motivations is okay, in fact, I think the action being taken on either basis alone would be, and a fortiori them being taken with both motivations is, a serious abuse of executive power.

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#106

Post by bobsoap »

olliej wrote: post #60
nxc18 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The craziest thing about the whole situations is there actually isn’t much evidence that vote by mail favors republicans; and yet they’re willing to degrade postal service to a country more reliant on it than ever, just for a small hope of electoral advantage. Edit: article in case anyone isn’t convinced (I was skeptical at first, given the tone of the discussion): https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/10/us/politics/vote-…

The concern for the GOP isn’t that democrats favor voting by mail, it’s that the GOP has worked hard to make it as hard as possible to vote in person in targeted (eg non Republican) communities. Widespread vote from mail defeats that as it means that their selective polling closures, and arbitrary barriers to voting in person, go away

Out of curiosity, what are those barriers?

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#107

Post by missedthecue »

riffic wrote: post #80

Buy stamps, as if they were toilet paper or war bonds. If the American public buys stamps they can have a collective action of helping to save one of its finest institutions.

Asking people to perform charity in order to save socialised letter delivery is going to be a hard sell.

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#108

Post by jrobn »

eropple wrote: post #79
jrobn wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s like saying genocide is ok because we need to decrease our population. They are mutual exclusive motivations.

He isn't saying it's okay .

He’s trying to justify that it is okay because it’s about privatization...months before a crucial election year. Doesn’t make sense. It’s gaslighting.

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#109

Post by augustt »

enraged_camel wrote: post #95
callmeal wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Unfortunately, HN userbase frowns upon what they incorrectly perceive as politicization of topics, so a lot of people will resort to whitewashing in the manner you described in order to avoid getting their posts flag-killed by partisans (which is what will happen to this comment - just watch).

Excuse me sir this is HN. Now repeat after me: both sides bad.

Re: Mail delays hit Philadelphia residents, short staffed USPS struggles to keep up

#110

Post by throwaway5752 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #48
throwaway5752 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its not a point about government effectiveness or efficiency. They kneecapped the USPS when they forced prefunding of pension liabilities ( https://www.cnbc.com/2011/10/24/the-truth-about-the-post-off... ). They had more legislative leverage prior to 2018, so they could have done all this much earlier. It is not possible to honestly discuss this in a meaningful way without acknowledging it's 3 months out from a presi…

Retirement benefits should be funded as they are accrued. That is not the problem. The problem is the USPS doesn’t have the power to price their products appropriately in order to pay for their expenses (including payroll which includes retirement benefits). If anything, all entities promising retirement benefits should be forced to do it the way USPS does. In fact, non government entities were forced to via the Pens…

I wish I hadn't mentioned the pension, because it takes away from the immediate and much worse problem that the governing party is trying to stay in power by preventing members of the other party from voting.
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