Post Office's Financial Woe's: 100% Due to Congress (and reversible)

[RyanPsych]

Both the news media and a number of politicians have claimed recently that the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) is in “crisis,” and that it is necessary to lay off thousands of workers or reduce service in order to make the post office fiscally stable. And the Post Office itself has proposed laying off as many as 120,000 employees and withdrawing from federal health care plans in order to navigate upcoming fiscal crunches.

It is true that USPS is facing fiscal challenges — it lost nearly $20 billion over the last four years and is at risk of not being able to meet a $5.5 billion mandated payment to the Treasury at the end of this month (which has been put off six weeks thanks to the last continuing resolution in Congress).

But what has been lost in the political debate over the Post Office is why it is losing this money. Major media coverage points to the rise of email or Internet services and the inefficiency of the post model as the major culprits. While these factors may cause some fiscal pain, almost all of the postal service’s losses over the last four years can be traced back to a single, artificial restriction forced onto the Post Office by the Republican-led Congress in 2006.

At the very end of that year, Congress passed the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 (PAEA). Under PAEA, USPS was forced to “prefund its future health care benefit payments to retirees for the next 75 years in an astonishing ten-year time span” — meaning that it had to put aside billions of dollars to pay for the health benefits of employees it hasn’t even hired yet, something “that no other government or private corporation is required to do.” As consumer advocate Ralph Nader noted, if PAEA was never enacted, USPS would actually be facing a $1.5 billion surplus today:

keep reading at: http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/09/28/330524/postal-non-crisis-post-office-save-itself/

[Autumn]

1. Why did they do this

where is the money?

[RyanPsych]

3. GOP controlled congress. Why do you think?

The Post Office is an example of government doing something very well. That didn't fit with their dogma. So- manufacture their financially insolvency.

As for the money- I think I read that they already have $20 billion saved up in their pension trust fund.

[liberal N proud]

2. Crisis by design

Then they will tell you that the post office needs to completely private with a buyer in mind.

GREED!

[RyanPsych]

4. and of course kill the Postal Union

and spend the billions of saved up on tax breaks for the wealthy (you know, to stimulate "job creators")

[woo me with science]

7. +1

This seems to be the new modus operandi.

[elocs]

5. So, for this act that passed at the end of 2006, what did Democrats do to stop or change it?

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h109-6407

Votes:
Dec 8, 2006: This bill passed in the House of Representatives by voice vote. A record of each representative’s position was not kept.

Dec 9, 2006: This bill passed in the Senate by Unanimous Consent. A record of each senator’s position was not kept.

What a Kumbaya moment that was. Passed in the House by a voice vote and in the Senate by Unanimous Consent. And now we have hand-wringing over the terrible consequences of this act.

If this was 2009 when Democrats controlled both houses of Congress, what would one suppose that Republicans would have done in the Senate? Didn't any Democrat have the foresight to see the pitfall in this legislation?

[flamingdem]

6. REC nt