PMG Megan J. Brennan told congressional leaders Jan. 21 that the Postal Service “[needs] legislation now.”
Brennan said USPS has streamlined operations, restructured networks, improved productivity for six consecutive years, grown its package business and stabilized its mail business, but without legislative reform, the organization’s losses will continue.
“Our financial challenges are serious, but they can be solved,” the PMG said at a hearing of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which oversees postal matters.
After months of listening to its stakeholders, identifying their concerns and educating them about the Postal Service’s needs, the PMG said the organization has identified several key areas where Congress could help.
For example, USPS wants Congress to require Medicare integration for all postal retiree health plans.
This would save the Postal Service money and reduce costs for employees and retirees while providing them with the same or better health coverage.
USPS also wants more flexibility to offer new products and services.
Additionally, the organization wants to continue the “exigent” surcharge in effect since 2014 and use postal-specific assumptions to calculate pension liabilities.
The PMG said enacting these provisions would save the Postal Service $27 billion during the next five years and allow the organization to “continue to provide affordable, reliable and secure delivery service.”
Brennan’s written testimony is available in the online newsroom.
And again absolutely nothing will happen or change……. especially in an election year…… it’s been this way for 45 years and the PO really isn’t high on alot of congressmen’s agenda
Forget about it!! There is isn’t enough maturity amongst USPS upper-management,the unions and,especially the U.S.Senate;4 the necessary mutual concessions(compromises)4 any such”postal reforms”. Again the retardation of ideological purity, be it Left-wing or Right wing; is 2 blame.
Politics from headquarters STAPH to bully line supervision. Mail street gang.
If you can’t write in proper English and can’t spell please get someone that can to write for you. Thanks.
Here’s another area that could greatly help the USPS. Postal banking as suggested by Bernie Sanders.
Of course, let’s not talk about the $5 BILLION annual payment to prefund retiree health benefits. It’s only the #1 reason the USPS has ANY debt. Nope. Nothing to see here.
2016 is the last year of that payment. Payments going forward will be recalculated. If postal service healthcare plans are integrated with Medicare the recalculation will show very minor payments required going forward.
While 2016 is the last year of the original proposal, a majority of those $5 billion annual payments were never made. But the debt load was attached going forward. To date there has been NOTHING to suggest payments will be reduced/abandoned.
Rather, the artificial debt load is used as justification the the service is broken, and must be privatized. The facts have always been that the retiree’s health care is about 80% funded already, and NONE of these payments were necessary.
The plan was put in place to straddle the USPS with an untenable debt load, which hamstrung flexibility in operations and financing. Making something not work, and then decrying its’ ineffectiveness makes privatizing more palatable, in the minds of the crafters of this plan. Unfortunately, our PMG’s duplicitous behavior serves to advance this line of thinking.
That’s not exactly true! You think that Congress is going to allow the USPS to just forget about the non-payments that haven’t been made the past three years to the PAEA requirement? No way! They will tack that on to any future payments, of which the USPS will not be able to make! Plus, the government has been crying for years about paying into social security, medicare and medicaid, but yet she wants to them to put hundreds of thousands of people on medicare? She is just as bad if not worse then Donahoe! She asks for everything BUT lifting the PAEA requirement! They are ALL afraid to ask for that. Afraid of losing their jobs!
I’m a Carrier, haha
Just end the prefunding of health care! Why is it that only the Postal Service must prefund it’s health care? No other organization in the world must prefund their health care! And for the crap that the unfortunate tax payer will be stuck “bailing out” the Postal worker, think of this. Every day the tax payer pays for the benefits of the under paid workers. The earned income tax credit, food stamps, welfare, Medicaid. What the cheap bastard employer doesn’t want to pay their employee, the tax payer pays out! That way the employer can hoard their money, while the taxpayer is sucked dry by the businessmen of America! The rich then can collect wealthfare!
Medicare is the primary payer and employer health insurance is secondary payer.
Amen!
It seems to me every body want to push their responsibilities on to the federal government. No retires health care. We need them on the Medicare. Medicare was ment to be a supplement to your existing medical coverage from your employer.
If management or any higher level executive had to do the same retirement requirements as what they preach and push off on the employee there would be a different song being sung.
first class mail is past history; fossil. Why pay postage for 2 day delivery to a physical address when communication technology can make it instant. 6 day street delivery is a wasted cost. Deliver time sensitive mail 7 days a week as customer will pay for this need. Amazon delivery is an example of creating revenue to meet customer demand. Revenue will increase as demonstrated to SPLY.
For nearly all private employer retiree medical health plans you have to sign up for Medicare when eligible and they only pay after Medicare. Any private company that provides drug coverage for Medicare part D eligible retirees gets a tax free payment from the US taxpayer equal to 28% of their cost. USPS retiree health care costs are among the only ones in the country not subsidized by the taxpayer. In fact because USPS employees pay into Medicare but don’t use it much. They are subsidizing Medicare.
I don’t understand why 1st class letters cost hasn’t gone up closer to a dollar, more in line with inflation of everything else in the world, in order to cover USPS costs
that’s true it is 5.5 billion/yr.
but it ends this yr
postal accountability and enhancement act of 2006
tied rate increases to a rise in inflation
The Trenton Metro Area Local APWU. They are sending employees back to work without giving them there paperwork and back pay with benefits. They are misrepresenting the workers. I was sent back to work after 2 years with evidence showing did nothing wrong. The agent signed off on my paperwork on a pre arbitration never saying any mention what I did or why I was brought back to work. He signed off with some guy that the name is not even legible. The letter said I would not receive my back pay and benefits. I look forward to sharing my story with the Oversight Committee and the media. I know I am not the only one that has
been taken advantage of by this union. I will not lose everything I worked so hard because of a racist, corrupt union. There is know difference between the union and management. I have spoke to many shop stewards in other states that said that I should have gotten my money back. I will not stop speaking up.
Here’s something else you ought to share with the Senate, Ms. PMG. Tell them how you tried unsuccessfully to circumvent the Mail Handler’s contract and outsource parcel handling to try to take away work from that craft, and who knows what else.
Every eligible arbitrator on the national level must read that decision and bear in mind when it comes time, should one of them be selected to arbitrate new contracts with the USPS and the four unions how blatantly and illegally you order your henchmen to violate your agreements on a normal basis and that basically you cannot be believed or trusted to hold up your end of any agreement.
How you dare presume you have any credibility at all with anybody is galling, and while you may be right that we need good postal reform, coming from you it’s a bad move, because were I a Senator who was interested in postal reform, you would be the last person I’d believe, given your track record for perjury, a list of contract and OSHA violations as long as a runway and general mismanagement at all levels.
This is what happens when people take the good ol’ boy/nepotism factor to ridiculous heights, promoting people who are not qualified to manage their shoelaces, much less billions of dollars and the country’s largest work force. I suppose that’s the case in most large businesses, but it just shows you it’s the craft and regular Joe employees who keep the country running, despite worldwide management’s efforts to totally fuck everything up.