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paulmcohen wrote:The USPS gets $96 million per year directly from the Federal Government plus they lost $20 BILLION in the last 4 years. UPS and FedEx make a profit and before they lost $20 billion they would be in bankruptcy, the USPS gets a pass on $5 billion per year of dept. So in reality the USPS get $5.1 Billion per year from the taxpayers.

That's a total negative, my friend. Not since 1971 when President Nixon said to operate it like a business. Yes, they are in debt, but no tax dollars have gone to our national post office system since then. Look under the title of What the Post Office wants you to know on this website.

http://about.usps.com/who-we-are/postal ... ome.htm#H2

And, as a former DOD employee, the current House of Representatives wants to cut our retirement by 25% or more.
And, they want to completely dispense with the retirement of postal employees. The Post Office has to pay for employee's insurance and retirement up front annually. Who else does that? That's the $5.5 billion that Congress mandated the Post Office does. No pass, no installment payments. Spent a couple of years working closely with the Post Office.

I'm as confused as JPG....maybe more so.
If the PO is a non-governmental entity and supposed to operate like a business, then isn't any money they receive from the government a bail out? If it's a loan and that loan is forgiven, doesn't that come from the taxpayers?

Gene Howe wrote:I'm as confused as JPG....maybe more so.
If the PO is a non-governmental entity and supposed to operate like a business, then isn't any money they receive from the government a bail out? If it's a loan and that loan is forgiven, doesn't that come from the taxpayers?

If the "loan" (to the USPS) is received from the US Treasury and then is not repaid it certainly is a bail out and ultimately comes from the tax base.

But when was it declared that the USPS would not repay the US Treasury?

Admittedly, that loan has grown by leaps and bounds over the last four or five years but I have never heard that the USPS was going to default.

Dusty,
I might be mistaken (that happens a lot) but, I thought I read that the 5 billion in loan(s?) will be forgiven. Or, has been???
Didn't the present USPS start off owing the gov. around that amount and, have never been able to repay it?
At any rate, I'll bet we get 3-4 lbs of 3rd class crap every week. They could start making money by just charging more for that postage.

Gene Howe wrote:Dusty,
I might be mistaken (that happens a lot) but, I thought I read that the 5 billion in loan(s?) will be forgiven. Or, has been???
Didn't the present USPS start off owing the gov. around that amount and, have never been able to repay it?
At any rate, I'll bet we get 3-4 lbs of 3rd class crap every week. They could start making money by just charging more for that postage.

I really don't know whether the USPS owes the Treasury or not. If the Secretary of the Treasury told me, I am not sure I would believe what I was told. I certainly can not count on the media to tell me.

As far as postal service, I would be satisfied if they delivered all of my mail once a week and cut out ALL OF THE TRASH MAIL.

I would have to do some fancy foot work with my billing schedule but that could be done.

http://about.usps.com/news/testimony/20 ... mg0327.htm

http://about.usps.com/who-we-are/financ ... 012-q2.pdf

JPG40504 wrote:Please explain how/who that debt is passed/owed. I'se confused!

The U.S. Postal Service is effectively bankrupt. The USPS expects to lose about $7 billion this year. The post office already has borrowed roughly $13 billion from Uncle Sam (who also borrowed that money). At the end of 2009, USPS had $33.5 billion in outstanding liabilities to the US government and another $54.8 billion in unfunded retiree health and pension obligations.

The USPS borrowed ~$55 Billion from their retirees (which would never be allowed if they were a private company) but the government will back them up when they do declare bankruptcy.

What more just Google "who holds USPS debt" and read GAO report.

dusty wrote:I really don't know whether the USPS owes the Treasury or not. If the Secretary of the Treasury told me, I am not sure I would believe what I was told. I certainly can not count on the media to tell me.

As far as postal service, I would be satisfied if they delivered all of my mail once a week and cut out ALL OF THE TRASH MAIL.

I would have to do some fancy foot work with my billing schedule but that could be done.

It is the junk mail that is keeping them alive. Since they have to deliver to every household, every day, having lots of junk mail gives them some incremential revenue.

paulmcohen wrote:It is the junk mail that is keeping them alive. Since they have to deliver to every household, every day, having lots of junk mail gives them some incremential revenue.

If they only delivered once a week...they would not need the junk mail to stay alive.

BTW, that junk mail isn't free. It all goes to the land fill as trash.

paulmcohen wrote:It is the junk mail that is keeping them alive.

To me it's knot junk mail, it's recyclables.