6/21/2018 Today, President Donald Trump recommends restructuring the Postal Service in his Reform Plan and Reorganization
Here are the proposals:
Restructure the Postal Service
Summary of Proposal: This proposal would restructure the United States Postal System to return it to a sustainable business model or prepare it for future conversion from a Government agency into a privately-held corporation. Like many European nations, the United States could privatize its postal operator while maintaining strong regulatory oversight to ensure fair competition and reasonable prices for customers. The President’s Task Force on the United States Postal System will make recommendations on reforms towards this goal in August 2018.
THE CHALLENGE
When the United States Postal Service (USPS) was created out of the Post Office Department in 1970, the Congress tasked it with binding the Nation together through correspondence; half a century later, that role has been increasingly supplanted by less expensive digital alternatives. USPS has extremely high fixed costs as a result of relatively generous employee benefits combined with a universal service obligation that is understood to require mail carriers to visit over 150 million addresses six days per week. Historically, this level of service was supported by a high volume of mail. Despite significant decline in volume in the internet age, the size of the delivery network has continued to grow to meet expectations of the current operating structure. USPS can no longer support the obligations created by its enormous infrastructure and personnel requirements. USPS already has over $100 billion in unfunded liabilities, a capital investment backlog, has posted losses for over a decade, and has no clear path to profitability without reform. A new model that adequately finances USPS while meeting the needs of rural and urban communities, large mailers, and small businesses is needed.
THE OPPORTUNITY
A privatized Postal Service would have a substantially lower cost structure, be able to adapt to changing customer needs and make business decisions free from political interference, and have access to private capital markets to fund operational improvements without burdening taxpayers. The private operation would be incentivized to innovate and improve services to Americans in every community.
WHAT WE’RE PROPOSING AND WHY IT’S THE RIGHT THING TO DO
This proposal would restructure USPS by aligning revenues and expenses to restore a sustainable business model and possibly prepare it for future conversion from a Government agency into a privately-held corporation. Like many European nations, the United States could privatize its postal operator while maintaining strong regulatory oversight to ensure fair competition and reasonable prices for customers.
A private Postal Service with independence from congressional mandates could more flexibly manage the decline of First-Class mail while continuing to provide needed services to American communities.
REFORM PLAN AND REORGANIZATION RECOMMENDATIONS
Profitability and Privatization: Considerations for the Future of USPS
In 2017, USPS experienced faster than expected declines in both First-Class Mail and Marketing Mail. First-Class Mail has declined 40 percent since 2001. Marketing mail is more stable, down only 10 percent since 2001, but is incredibly sensitive to price and market downturns. At the same time, USPS has continued to grow its package delivery business, particularly the last-mile delivery that is relatively cheaper for them because of the huge fixed network they must maintain to support mail delivery. However, the revenues from lower-margin package delivery and other competitive products cannot replace declining revenue from the market-dominant (monopoly) products in the long-run. This year, USPS continued its six-year string of defaults and for the first time defaulted on pension-related payments rather than just health benefit prepayments. USPS’s current model is unsustainable. Major changes are needed in how the Postal Service is financed and the level of service Americans should expect from their universal service operator.
One successful model of Postal reform internationally has been to transition to a model of private management and private or shared ownership. USPS is caught between a mandate to operate like a business but with the expenses and political oversight of a public agency. A private postal operator that delivers mail fewer days per week and to more central locations (not door delivery) would operate at substantially lower costs. A private entity would also have greater ability to adjust product pricing in response to changes in demand or operating costs. Freeing USPS to more fully negotiate pay and benefits rather than prescribing participation in costly Federal personnel benefit programs, and allowing it to follow private sector practices in compensation and labor relations, could further reduce costs.
A privatized Postal Service could be structured like an investor-owned utility and continue to be regulated by the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC), a successor agency, or another Federal regulator such as the Federal Trade Commission, consistent with the existing models of privatization in Europe. Even with continued regulation, a privatized Postal Service would be more insulated from politics and more likely to succeed as a financially-viable business. A private entity would also have access to private capital markets to raise money for needed improvements like new vehicles without burdening taxpayers with additional liabilities.
USPS privatization through an initial public offering (IPO) or sale to another entity would require the implementation of significant reforms prior to sale to show a possible path to profitability. Most foreign posts that have been privatized have been profitable at the time of the sale. In contrast, USPS has lost over $65 billion since the last recession and recorded a $2.7 billion loss last fiscal year. To reach profitability, most international postal operations have gone through significant restructuring, including shrinking their physical and personnel footprints. In some cases, foreign governments have had to absorb legacy retirement liabilities in order to prepare a postal operator for sale. The existing unfunded liabilities in USPS’s retirement programs total more than $100 billion. USPS owes an additional $15 billion to Treasury’s Federal Financing Bank and has further liabilities to the Department of Labor’s Workers Compensation program. According to the Postal Service’s own estimates, the Agency is insolvent, with liabilities exceeding assets by more than $120 billion.
DELIVERING GOVERNMENT SOLUTIONS IN THE 21ST CENTURY
Forthcoming Recommendations by the Task Force on the United States Postal System
To address these major issues and identify solutions, possibly including private ownership, the President has issued Executive Order 13829: Task Force on the United States Postal System. The Task Force will conduct a thorough evaluation of the operations and finances of the Postal Service and make recommendations for reform consistent with this reorganization proposal. The Task Force will examine:
1. The expansion and pricing of the package delivery market and the USPS’s role in competitive markets;
2. The decline in mail volume and its implications for USPS self-financing and the USPS monopoly over letter delivery and mailboxes;
3. The definition of the ‘‘universal service obligation’’ in light of changes in technology, e-commerce, marketing practices, and customer needs;
4. The USPS role in the U.S. economy and in rural areas, communities, and small towns; and
5. The state of the USPS business model, workforce, operations, costs, and pricing.
The recommendations will include administrative and legislative reforms to the United States postal system that promote our Nation’s commerce and communication without shifting additional costs to taxpayers. The report will be available by August 10, 2018.
1 UK NationalAudit Office, The Privatisation of Royal Mail, April 2014, Pg. 15: rti
2 2017 Report on Form 10-K United States Postal Service, Balance Sheet, CSRS and FERS Unfunded Retirement Benefits, and Funded Status
- APWU: Statement by President Dimondstein on outrageous White House plan to privatize USPS June 21, 2018
- USPS responds to Trump’s privatization plan
August 10, 2018 President Trumps audit day is coming……is going to be………………………….. HUGE! IOD Brennen start packing your bags!
Somebody had to pull the plug on this diversity experiment gone horribly wrong…these clowns thought they were untouchable and could keep running this sucker in the ground….then a new sheriff came to town and will expose these clowns on August 10th.
So freshen up your LinkedIn page and add another worthless online degree from one of those diploma mills….for it’s going to be a bloodbath.
Obammy & Mike cashed out on a book deal worth $70 million dollars. Obammy & Mike just signed a deal with Netflix for $100 million dollars. when postal department workers start throwing around the class warfare 1% garbage, I know to put them in the under 70 IQ box. verbal diarrhea at its finest. it is a shame to see people who can not think for themselves, so sad!
5 years ago Mainland Communist China reduced their government work force by 5 million people…..so don’t think President Trump is the only one who sees waste in government. Russia’s Putin trimmed back too. google the story…….even socialist/commie/ regressives know how to lop off heads for the good of the whole. your just spoiled and know nothing about business 101. as they say “its a recession when your neighbor is out of work, its a depression when you are out of work”! chow baby!
Government Account Office (GAO) is already coming out and saying the place has no money for delivery vehicles……..the August 10, 2018 audit report must have uncovered a lot more than the corrupt po mismanaging bureaucrats admitted to. This Way To The 40K BUYOUT Egress Exit! oh baby bring it on and fill my pockets with shekels! THE DUMP IS BANKRUPT!
Really, what did anyone expect would happen? Go back to 2006 and study the disaster that was negotiated by Bush and postmaster master general. It was designed to destroy the usps. Obama could have corrected it, he chose not to. A letter writing campaign to congress and the president were ignored. The fix was in, the USPS was dead!
After their plot in ‘06, the USPS was $10 BILLION in debt to the US govt every year! Look it up! Virtually no business could survive that anchor around its neck!
Good Bye USPS!!
To all the city carriers that have complained about Rolando and the NALC If you are a union member put in your request to be removed. Give yourself a pay raise. I never have been a member and never will be a member of a union that forces worker to be accountable for 95+% of the working day with no flexibility.
Trump 2020 I am all in. first one to come along who will fix it. remember former PMG Marvin Runyon (RIP) he is credited with stopping the “Going Postal” thing. he told Bill Clinton and the Democrats that the PO MISMGT was over staffed by 50%, they got rid of him. they are not going to get rid of President Trump. Trump knows the PO is an 18 wheeler going down hill without any brakes.
Clinton Uranium 1 Russian Scam is the real crime……..stop rubbing your two brains cells together……it just shows how stupid you are. Demonrat talking points from CNN……dumb as dirt!
When the investigation of the Russian scandal brings out the truth, the current resident who doesn’t read and doesn’t show leadership may be spendin’ some time in the clink…and the IDEAS of which Mr. “no can read” is being told to put out by Russians, brutal dictators, and 1%er’s who give him his marching orders will spend some time there too. Tax returns? Bankruptcy declaration without representation? Show us the $$$(and REAL financial statements) Jerry (was a racecar driver). The truth will set us free!!! The blue dress lies will pale in comparison to the STORMY lack of family values that are about to be exposed…Have a nice day, orange or stripes, take your pick. 😛 😛 😛
AMZN $1730.00 a share.
I was told that a carrier that voted for President Dump is now worried about what to do about retirement. He will be eligible soon, but has heard about the cuts his hero wants to make on retirement. He found out he would be denied his S.S. supplement $ 1,000 per month, and further cuts to retirement. His hero wants the privatized firm to take over the retirement and health insurance. The carrier doesn’t know what to do! Tough, He didn’t care if others were screwed. If he can dish it out he should be able to take it. What ever happens he asked for it! And after the rich received big tax cuts the added wealth will trickle down to him.
STUPID IS AS STUPID DOES
A filter down system that delivers to every address, every day and this idiot wants to destroy it. He calls himself a business man. Only a moron would fail to see the money making possibilities of delivering anything to everybody, every day. It could be fixed and the people working there could continue to make reasonable middle class incomes, something Trump seems to have a problem with!
Maybe Trump could learn something from Bezos
I strongly sense that we are in for a “reckoning” to paraphrase Doc Holiday. In my 33 plus years with the USPS I have seen serious threats on the horizon (the Reagan Administration), but I think this one is for real.
I was never a Carrier, but I want to thank all of the Carriers who enabled the USPS to last this long. Many people love their carriers and see them working diligently every day. But for the PR they provided the USPS over the years, we would have been toast long ago.
“the agency is insolvent, liabilities exceeding assets by 120 Billion” you do understand that it means in the real world that the Postal Circus is bankrupt. owe the US Treasury $15 Billion, you do understand that is taxpayer money, so much for the canard, they do not use taxpayer money. (right up there with the pre-funding hoax that they stopped paying in 2009) I am sure when the August 10, 2018 audit is completed you will find the numbers are worse then they admit…..come on, these dopes have always been good at juicing numbers to get PFP bonus money….at least that ship has sailed. 40K Buyout and you will see a stampede for the exit. the bottom line is the PO mismanaging bureaucrats suckered the dopes in Washington, DC for 35 years………didn’t fool President Trump! there will be hell to pay when they lift the rock up and expose this place to sunlight.
Google the term “featherbedding” it puts the feather in the company unions bed! well, at least 1% of postal workers see through the fog.
Trump will get us our 40K BUYOUT! Rolando/Diamondstein/Hogrogian do not want us to get one so we are kept on the plantation to feed our dues money for their high lifestyle……..they really wish they had Trump’s money. phony company unions who negotiate separately yet ALL come up with a crummy 1% year after year and you think that is just by chance? google the word COMPANY UNION. wake up sheeple, these clowns are PMG Megan Brennen’s Plantation Crackers! THE 40K BUYOUT WILL COME FROM PRESIDENT TRUMP-YOU HEARD IT HERE FIRST! Muffin Megan Brennen & Union Thugs want to keep the status quo to fill their pockets while they crap on you. they are running a con that should be busted by RICO Act.
well, well, well, what goes around comes around. Democrat Jimmy Carter and CAB Chairman Alfred Cahn under Carter came out with the 1978 Airline Deregulation Act which caused over 600,000 Union Airline Workers to lose their jobs and thousands of others to take pay cuts up to 50%. this opened the floodgates to spread to the trucking, telecommunications and other industries that were deregulated over the next 20 years and the losses that went with it. I do not feel sorry for any postal worker-welcome to the club Demonrat chumps! suck it up! don’t you know the Democrats are out for the little guy? out to screw them that is!
The end is near. The RATS are scurrying. Get out while
you can.
Oh I forgot! It’s the high wages, and benefits that us employees beg and scrape by with, that cause all you billion dollar companies that are built and paid for by the tax payer and ran by HIGHLY PAID CEO’s and MANAGERS that cause all your financial troubles! HA! HA!
Get rid of all Postal Management and install a management that does not pay itself, high wages. high bonuses, and waste money to fleece it’s own pockets and destroys the very service company it is trying to manage.. A management that treats employees with dignity and respect. A management that can provide decent equipment to every employee and maybe a decent delivery vehicle with A/C that can handle the load while keeping the delivery person somewhat comfortable and SAFE!
HA! HA! HA! Never happen in a million years! CRASH and BURN USPS!!!!
these dolts at the PO have a hard time balancing a checkbook with $600 dollars in it, you expect them to understand why the PO is bankrupt? crying louder than a welfare queen cheat who was busted. you want cradle to the grave-move to Moscow! dumber than dirt!
let me help you. unload the drama. do not think of the PO as an employee, study it as a Harvard Business School student would do sitting in class and doing a case study. you have four companies-UPS, FDX, AMZN, & USPS and after looking over the finance of the last 5 years, one has to go. now you pick the one that has to go, easy peasy! even a Tesla could figure it out!
Is the purpose of the post office to connect all Americans? If it is, then turning it into a private concern will destroy that mission. Fed Ex and UPS will cherry pick the places that make money and ignore the rest of the country. The winner take all capitalism might destroy this, but the Harvard School students can sit back and play with their numbers as our economy collapses. Remember just because you can count things, does not mean they count.
See the article written today by The Atlantic correspondent who lasted one day as an Amazon Flex driver in San Francisco. Same problems with every delivery company.
what do Tom McCann and the post office have in common…….300,000 lazy loafers…….about time! Amazon rules while you suckers drool. entitlement monopoly is kaput. go get a real job! bonus money for losing money, that alone is a reason to shut it down.
Ha who do you think delivers all the Amazon?! 7 days a week…
Only when greed and gluttony are rid of, will the PO be the leader in postal innovation. We could start by keeping congress away from the interest of our prefunded medical, and retirement funds. . .
Dumber and poorer!!!! Charge em triple!!!
Lazy union officials crying about privatization is funny. They sold out to management years ago, just look at the tiny raises we get. They know their days are numbered.
Postal managements solution is write up the letter carriers all the way and the mail volume will comeback. NALCs response is they could do that , management is allowed to mismanage and they are allowed to be wrong, Quit insulting our intelligence privatize this piece of garbage of an organization.
AMZN $1730.00 a share!
So end another government service so a private corp. can make money. The President is an expert on running business even though he filed for bankruptcy six times and cheated workers and businessmen with the help of the law. Started a university that had to pay 25 million to settle legal claims. Ran Atlantic City to ruin! And for those of you that keep bragging about UPS/FDX/AMZN stock, so you are a big time operator. You are sooo smart, and everyone else is an idiot. Mr. precious, the President thinks it’s ok just to take the employees, retired and currently working, out of the Federal retirement and health insurance. And place the people into the private co.’s plans. He picked Royal Mail’s idea. Well the employees were taken out of the government retirement and placed I the private co.’s plan. The employees retirement income was cut when the new co. started. Last year the Royal Mail wanted to cut their retirement income again. The employees went on strike. Even after the strike their retirement income was still cut for the second time. They can stick that idea up their ear, or some other place that fits.
PAEA was a voice vote and passed almost unanimously. Democrats were just as much at fault for the legislation as Republicans. Obama had a veto-proof congress for his first 2 years. He could have gotten any legislation passed that he wanted. He did nothing to reverse the burden of the prefunding. Democrats are not your freind either.
In 2006 in the last throws of the Bush adm. the Republicans imposed an impossible requirement on the USPS. Fund 75 yrs of retirees health benefits in a 10 yr time span. Let’s be very clear, the USPS is basically a non profit.
Republicans new exactly what would happen when every year for the next 10 yrs a non profit would have to come up with an extra 5.5 billion. Their excuse was always that they didn’t want the tax payers to have to bail out the USPS. But the real reason was to destroy an agency so important that the founding fathers saw fit to safeguard its existence in the Constitution. And why? just so their donors could rip it from Americans hands and privatize it for their gain. As far as the excuse of not burdening tax payers with a possible bailout, if you look up in the article under the heading “USPS privatization through an initial public offering (IPO) or sale to another entity would require the implementation of significant reforms prior to sale to show a possible path to profitability.”
It states “In some cases, foreign governments have had to absorb legacy retirement liabilities in order to prepare a postal operator for sale.” Later in the paragraph it states that the USPS has liabilities somewhere around 120 billion. These statements show the real plan they have for the USPS, use taxpayer monies to pay off the liabilities and provide a clean slate for whatever one of their donors buys the USPS and proceeds to gut service and presto, hundreds of thousands of middle class jobs with good pay and benefits gone.
You losers know nothing about the postal service
lobbyist and special interest groups , etc. wrote the recommendation for Trump wanting a piece of the pie. They don’t give a damn about the rural area only the money to be made from large volume deliveries to densely populated areas! The rest of the country will go back to the old Post Office Department pre-1975 funded by taxpayers.
OOPS pre-1971
Trump is an idiot. Postal workers who voted for him are idiots also
oh please that is getting old. they have not paid into pre-funding since 2009-$50 Billion not paid, what did they do with it they pissed it away. Government Accounting Office (GAO) even said the dump is bankrupt. instead of your pre-funding canard, why not just say postal monies were abducted by aliens……you would make your sense postal slug. go slow for more dough, and lie about a pre-funding story that PMG Pat Donehoe said was “fake news”!
even thought the USPS does not pay the 5 billion every year, the billions are on the books each year and counted as a deficit falsely destroying the USPS.
Gee, I wonder if there’s a company out there that would agree to the pre-funding mandate…….?
It’s about time, to get rid of Fat Cat Unions, who are using member’s due to support the liberals agenda, like abortion, illegal immigrant. Thank you Mr. President
Do you think you’ll like working for $10 an hour with no insurance, paid leave, or other benefits? Look at the CCAs and PSEs. That’s how it would be with a privatized nonunion PO, only probably worse.
it’s like Obammy said-PO is going to Change and Hope you have a job ……….that plan helped destroy the USA, let us see what it does to PO. ha ha ha!
trumps an idiot! he couldnt run a lemonade stand!
The mandate to pay healthcare costs in advance doomed the post office. It was an obvious trick to get the Post Office in a poor financial position so greedy people like Trump & his buddies can take over city delivery where it is profitable and leave rural areas unserved. It was engineered by Bush & Dumbsfeld. Sad all these people will lose their jobs. In 30 years it will be a self driving vehicle driving up to cluster boxes and opening them with a magnetic key. It will put the mail in from presorted trays close the door and go on all with no human involved!
it’s done…..wake up to that fact. po mismgt ran it into the dirt while the company unions watched.
look at who screams the loudest when the status quo is threatened! bring it on, bring it all down man! this Trump is a hoot and a smart one to boot! PFP bonus scam out the window here we come! $40K Buyout please President Trump! turn out the lights, the party is over-Dandy Don. it’s starting to get real funny…..nothing left for the diversity clowns.
Coo coo!
Laureate, for-profit University, over $4 Billion in debt gave Bill Clinton 16.5 million dollars to get Hillary to steer State Department “training seminars” to them. google that story….makes Trump University 25 million fake news.you jokers need to find a new paper route…..your old one is going “private” lol!
Trump university success story.
Private Eyes….. wasn’t that a song by Hall & Oates?
Something must give. Too many Chiefs and not enough Indians. End the NALC mantra of “Go Slow-More Dough”. Six day MAIL delivery is stoopid.
The U S Postal Service is an undervalued asset, and deliberately so. The arguments that digital communications and transactions have devalued and depressed the need for a national postal operator, “NPO”, are spurious and driven by a private sector drive to carve up lucrative market segments at the expense of the American people.
There is no supporting evidence that a privatized model will bind the nation together, whether through communications, transactions, or commerce, rather it will contribute to the continued ‘balkanization’ of America and continued division (1).
Delivery to the door is not obsolete, it is in fact a critical element of “demand driven delivery”, “D3”, as shown repeatedly in research (Amazon is driving towards D3 as part of its overall business strategy).
And the customer relationship management value and ROI of direct mail versus the digital tsunami of wasted eMarketing, and the growing threat of digital Identity theft, financial hacking, and fraud from the expanding exposure of Americans to online advertising and phishing, particularly in social media channels cannot be overstated. In fact, the upcoming generation of Millennials is returning to direct mail and print media response (2).
1. “American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America” – http://www.businessinsider.com/regional-differences-united-states-2018-1
2. “Direct Mail Marketing Still Effective for Millennials” – https://www.drmg.com/2018/04/direct-mail-marketing-effective-millennials/
All this to please Trump’s blood-thirst for Jeff Bezos. Brain damage is the only explanation.
Same song and dance. Government’ been talking privatization for the P.O. since the early 1970’s. Over 45 years later here we are still talking about the same stuff.
Bingo!
One HUGE difference between now and then. Mail volume. Many like to ignore that change.
No private corporation,anywhere on planet Earth,is interested acquiring the United States Postal Service(USPS);in 2018!! And the”privitisation”,spelled in Europe,with an”s”,instead of a”z”;occurred there-mostly back in the 1990 s.
You got exactly what you asked for 19 months ago.
you do not need a weatherman to tell you which way the wind is blowing-Dillion. loss of monopoly and 1st class mail decline is the death blow, sprinkle on the stupid company unions, socialist, pc liberal diversity for the sake of diversity crap and the uneducated po mismanaging bureaucrats and you have a total failure. corruption, like giving PFP bonus money when you lose $Billions……just highlights the high level of corruption. (right under the PO OIG I might add) so kiddies I suggest you hug a stupidvisor and get the ESOP paperwork out and bend over and kiss this metastisized, stage 4 cancer cell goodbye. should have purchased the AMZN IPO 13 years ago like I told you too! ($1730.22 a share) all you Trump haters think he is stupid and you are the smart one’s………..we shall soon see lol.(let us see who has a higher IQ, a Billionaire or a postal slug?) maybe Sanders will sell his 3 houses and buy the new PO stock lol. (the Vermont lake house he got from Shillary under the table to take a dive will be hard to pry from this commies hands, he thinks it is his Datcha on the Black Sea lol) everything has to come to an end…..this place should have been busted up under RICO years ago!
Hey, I got a lake house in Vermont. Wonder if they’re my neighbors.
It’s about time. Door delivery is an outmoded, outdated, & unsustainable method of operation. It really is ridiculous
The mailbox nowdays is the holding cell for the trash can. If you want door delivery, pay a monthly fee. Otherwise, go to a central location & pick up your mail yourself. During this transition, PO boxes should be free… and NO! we won’t deliver to your PO box & a physical address. If you are disabled, you may be eligible for door delivery at a discounted rate. Or, just have a friend or associate pick up your mail from your free PO box.
Bush and the Republican congress passed a law mandating the Postal Service which had been operating at a profit,Pre-fund future retiree’s health care benefits resulting in a cost of 32 BILLION dollars since 2007,no other enterprise in America is required by law to do this.prior to this stupid mandate implemented to help the privatize loving Republicans achieve their dream of privatizing the best postal service on the planet.
The postal reform act of 2006 and 2016,is the only reason the postal service is showing a paper loss from 1970 -2006 we always did just fine. congress imposed this burden on USPS. Alls congress has to do is stop dipping into postal $ and creating this fake deficit to push for big business takeover of USPS .Some of us know the truth.
Yep!
former PMG Donehoe and the Government Accounting Office have put that pre-funding lie to bed………..they have defaulted on pre-funding payments since 2009 so that non-payment is not the cause of the 100 Billion loss since 2009…….put down the pot pipe and try and follow along. it is like crying about the high price of airline tickets when you are too afraid to fly. please pick another non-issue to run with, this one is now DOA! good God are you people thick, Harvard MBA’s your not!
The reform payments haven’t been paid in years. That excuse is no longer valid.