The federal spending plan for Fiscal Year 2016 released by the House of Representatives on Tuesday once again aims to cut letter carriers’ pay.
The FY2016 budget measure, released by the House Budget Committee, calls for requiring all federal employees to pay more out of their own pockets toward their retirement benefits.
While the House bill doesn’t say exactly how much of a pay cut its authors are looking for, it does refer to the recommendations of President Barack Obama’s 2010 National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, which concluded that the government and its employees should share equally in paying for pension benefits. The commission is more commonly known as the Simpson-Bowles Commission, named after its appointed chairmen: former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-WY) and Erskine Bowles, a former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton.
“The Simpson-Bowles plan calls for all federal worker contributions—under both CSRS and FERS—to go up to 6 percent,” NALC President Fredric Rolando said. “In other words, they want 6 percent of your pay to go toward your pensions, with no accompanying increase in your pension benefits.”
Under this plan, for example, a top step letter carrier (Step O) would see an annual reduction in pay of more than $3,500.
“The Postal Service doesn’t take a dime of taxpayer money,” Rolando said. “So including letter carriers and all postal workers in this wholly unfair plan, especially under the guise of ‘deficit reduction,’ makes no sense at all.
“Over the last several years, federal workers’ compensation has seen cuts amounting to $159 billion,” he said. “And postal pension accounts are almost fully funded right now, paid for through the sale of postage and postal products, not by the taxes that fund the compensation of the rest of the federal workforce.
“It’s time for all of us to tell Congress that enough is enough,” Rolando said.
The House plan is the first step in what will be a months-long budget process; Fiscal Year 2016 doesn’t start until Oct. 1.
Meanwhile, the Senate version is expected to be released today.
Click here to read more in The Washington Post.
Time to replace the whole bunch!
Democrat Sen Diane Feinstein (former Mayor of SFO) and husband have a no bid contract with the USPS to sell postal buildings……since the start of this contract they have made over a billion dollars……..and still continue to sell. Feinstein never worked in private industry, only civil service, has a net worth over 70 million. I find it strange that Diamondstein and Powell rail against Staples but never mention these two rich 1% democrat crony capitalists……why is that? oh yeah dmocrats are for the little people, oh that right now I get it………like hillary’s cattle futures profit! sell the building right out from under the little people, but mums the word. In addition, the last 6 years Obumma has watched this all play out….oh, oh mums the word……just keep pulling the democrat lever and all will be well lol. dumb as dirt!
I believe that the house and senate should not only prefund their health care, like they did to the Postal Service, they should also take big cuts in other benefits! They should screw them selves as they screw others. The senators and congressmen should also scan everything as they work, just like carriers must.
Why does Congress get free health care with a $174,000 salary and we pay for health care with just a $50.000 Salary ? And on top of that they want 6% more of our pay for no increase in retirement. Let’s tell them to make all federal employees the same for benefits and see how fast they change their mind.
Why Congress hates federal employees and postal workers especially is not hard to figure out. We represent the middle class and are one of the last holdouts of organized labor, something Republicans especially just cannot deal with. They have said in the past that they would love to wind the clock back 100 years back to the good old Industrial Revolution days where workers were basically financial slaves, and there were only two classes, the poor and the very rich.
And half the country apparently agrees with those bastards because they buy the hype about being “patriotic” and believe whatever FOX News and the likes of Limbaugh tell them. Some people have to be lead around by the nose, and that is always a sign of a lack of individual drive. It’s a pathological need to be part of a group, surrounded by others who think, or don’t think, if you prefer all the same so nobody has to step out and do anything for themselves.
To be fair, there are plenty of those on the left who “belong” for the same herding instinct reasons too, and this behavior has resulted in a severe division of the working people that could easily end up destroying the nation, amendment by amendment. Perhaps it’s typical behavior in the overall scheme of things, where ruling classes and nations have almost always imploded at one time in their histories. Sometimes the only way to unite a country is when everybody is down and out and then revolution takes place, but Washington is too slick for that. The only thing that can bring the ruling elite down is when there are so few people left who can buy stocks, have any money in a bank, be able to afford even a cheap car and businesses close in droves, followed by the banks and Wall Street in a modern super Depression scenario. At that point, it would not surprise me to see the U.S. with its mentality to start a huge war to revive their darling industrialist pals at the expense and deaths of possibly millions of people.
This is pertinent to the article because if postal employees eventually get clobbered and unions vanish, it’ll clear the way to slash everybody’s pay and benefits. I worry about this increase in retirement contributions with no subsequent return on the investment because as one poster indicated, Rolando of the NALC is the weakest president the union has ever had. He will be looking at thousands of carriers withdrawing first their COLCPE contributions and then dropping out of the union altogether. The NALC needs to get a lot tougher and do it immediately.
Poor salty…
Gonna cut all Congressional “Bill ##### Carrier’s” pay too ?
John F Kennedy is spinning in his grave over the radical marxist in the white house. in addition, while you are talking about the South you forgot to mention the KKK was the SA Brown shirts of the southern democrats. someone who knows nothing about history should not call people stupid. you sound as dumb as dirt! think about saving the country and not just your crummy little working class civil service job. what a loser. soon mcdonalds workers in State of Washington will be making as much as you lol……..bet they have a better grasp on history too.
demonrats and rethuglians are no friend of postal workers. demonrats only support unions so they can launder their political slush fund money. we need a nationalist party in usa, enough of these citizens of the world creeps always telling people how they should live their lives. demonKKKats give billions to illegal criminal aliens and want to take pennies away from postal workers……….next election I will vote for none of the above.
Did anyone read past the headline?? The article says that it is all Congress’s fault because they listened to the president’s recommendations. Really?? No one else read past the headline? Are we all really that stupid?
No wonder national news on ABC, CBS and NBC lead with traffic accidents, weather and entertainment news. You cannot handle – or even search for the truth. Maybe my fellow workers deserve what they get? Or will you read the article again and see what it actually says. Congress did nothing except say OK lets do what the President wants.
but make sure you give to COLPE though brothers and sisters
Rolando needs to use 5 day delivery as a bargaining tool….. he doesn’t have the balls too though….. he will let the current workforce be screwed over again, just to maintain paying members…. just watch
If the bill is named after the authors it should be called Dumbhead Bill.
Low life congressmen pass laws that they think are good…as long as the laws don’t apply to them. They all should be bounced from their perches and let them live under the laws that they themselves created for a year; then they’d change their tune.
congress needs to take a pay cut. and a recess cut. they are always on recess. screw those a-holes!
Most companies are eliminating pensions ~~ and you whine??!!
No whining here. Married to the POST OFFICE because of what it has to offer..
Do not worry about being tapped on the shoulder to be laid off…
Those days are gone for new employees…..
Companies should be required by law to provide pensions to their employees.
The entire issue is not why government employees have good benefits and pensions; the issue is why don’t private sector employees have them. They’ll tell you the usual big lie about global competition, when the real reason is unrestrained greed on the part of the parasitic Wall Street vermin who run the system. Our government is dominated by the whores in both parties who take money from these corporate scumbags, but the Republicans are far more gone on it than the Democrats. We need to amend the Constitution to override a couple of horrible Supreme Court decisions, over a century apart, that give corporations the same legal status as people, For-profit corporations should be prohibited from engaging in most political activity, including giving money directly to candidates, to parties, or to any supposedly independent political action committees. They should be strictly limited in any attempts to influence the votes of their employees, including by claiming that voting for a particular candidate, or supporting or opposing legislation, will mean the end of their jobs. Any such claims must be backed up by independent research and cleared with an independent authority before they can be presented, because corporations and their representatives lie constantly about everything and can be trusted with nothing.
With Congress doing very little for the last 6 years they are the one’s who need a pay cut and take 6% pay cut with no extra benefits for retirement. Their lack of leadership for this country is the worst it has every been.
F ING THE MIDDLECLASS
Embarrassing. They serve four years and get lifetime perks. Yeah, I trust these congressman.
They have to make sure that they have enough money to give benefits to illegal aliens.