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USPS to Implement New Service Standards
So when I was born first class mail was 3 cents with a 3 day deliver now it's 58 cents with a five day window! Which is 19 times higher and the US cent was 95 % copper back then. The last 3 years they have raise rates 4 times! A bad sign for the almighty dollar!
serf
- Plan ahead – For mail or correspondence that requires a deadline, the Postal Service encourages consumers to plan ahead and send their mail early. You likely wouldn’t wait to mail your mom a Mother’s Day card the day before or on Mother’s Day, so mail your letters and greeting cards with the Postal Service early so the Postal Service can ensure it reaches its final destination on-time.
- When sending mail long distance, mail early – If it would take you more than a day to drive your mail to its destination, make sure to give your long-distance mail some extra time to travel with USPS.
On October 1, 2021, First Class mail standards were expanded by the United States Postal Service (USPS) to allow for longer delivery times of up to 5 days. This change is in addition to the price increase on First Class postage that went into effect on August 29, 2021
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If you are upset with the post office charging you .58 to send a letter you can always use UPS instead. Same state delivery with them should be next day. Of course they will charge you about $12.40 for using their service. Don't forget that .58 USPS charge will get your letter from the Florida Keys all the way to Alaska. Seems like a bargain to me.
When I was born, gas averaged less than .30/gal. The average postal carrier wage was about a buck an hour and they had few if any benefits. If you want a real awakening check what their average wage + health insurance + retirement adds up to today. Now I suppose they could raise that .58 postage rate to match UPS and increase their workforce instead of reducing it and keep you happy with shorter delivery times. Which would you prefer? Bob
You've all heard of "affirmative action" no doubt. This is a direct result.
Unions. Enough said.
I just buy those "Forever" stamps in very large quantities at the current price. It has proven to be a good investment over a couple of years' time.
You invest in a monopoly ran by politicians which it seems to be broke with massive debt and getting credit (Taxes) off the backs of U.S. Citizens while the public pays interest in (Inflation) for it all. In time they will prevail with a new deal (Reset) for us once again!
It's corruption on a grand scale and nobody can do anything because the g-ds of the republic with freedom & liberty says it's so. Otherwise, you will see them dish out real justice if you disagree.
It's the carrot and the stick game played on us for centuries, and we fall for it time and time again.
serf
Can you show me where the USPS receives any form of tax income/support from the Federal govt? They don't and it shows that your research is lacking. When you lead off with a false statement it destroys the credibility of the entire post. Think about it, why would they be in debt if they were hooked up to the government trough? Are any other Fed govt departments carrying debt? Bob
There is always another way to err rob the treasury there Bob! i wonder If that is why the first class rate keeps climbing? It's all smoke and mirrors and new ideas to create derivatives to fund the socialism. Just watch'um steal us blind in many ways than you can imagine!
Like that new contract for electrical mail delivery vehicles! it's all a big joke on the poor taxpayers! Have I mentioned who backs up federal pension plans with default Insurance, There Bob? You really need to wake up there, my friend.
They rob Peter to pay Paul with all their debt ridden funny money! Don't you just love our illustrious Congress, joined at the hip with the money changers! An increase of of half a point on our interest savings next year is just window dressing from The Feds. Inflation is already at 6% or more right now.
serf
The American Rescue Plan!
For postal workers, the American Rescue Plan has established paid leave that is similar, but an improvement upon, the Family First Coronavirus Recovery Act (FFCRA) Leave that had expired December 31st, allowing workers to take COVID-related paid time off to care for themselves and for their loved ones. Postal workers also secured a critical workers compensation reform, which will streamline COVID-19 claims.
July 29, 2020
WASHINGTON – Today the U.S. Department of the Treasury announced that it had reached an agreement with the United States Postal Service (USPS) on the material terms and conditions of a loan of up to $10 billion to the USPS under Section 6001 of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. The loan will be documented in an agreement to be developed and executed by Treasury and the USPS.
The CARES Act authorizes the USPS to borrow up to $10 billion from Treasury for operating expenses if the USPS determines that, due to the COVID-19 emergency, it will not be able to fund operating expenses without borrowing money.
If you are losing money every year how do you make up the difference?
Well the USPS does it in two ways:
In 2006 Congress mandated that the USPS prefund its retirement plan. The USPS implemented this plan and did so until 2012 when decreasing revenue and higher costs prevented paying into the fund. Congress has always had control over postal rates and would not allow increases that would solve the funding problem. Prefunding was actually a good idea and would prevent defaulting on pensions but Congress put roadblocks in the path of it ever coming to fruition, thereby blocking their own mandate.
As far as replacing the current postal vehicles, it's about damn time! Here is some info for you about the current vehicles;
It looks like your hyperbole about replacing them all with electric vehicles is, for now, a bit inaccurate;
I would imagine that in some places an electric vehicle makes sense but in others gas will still be the rule. Bob
Edit to add - I unfortunately know more about the condition of the current post office LLVs than most, and believe me the fleet is in terrible shape and should have been replaced years ago but Congress controlling the postal rates prevented this.
I listed theses two articles to provide you with information so that you can look beyond what info you have gotten from biased websites. Actual creditable information is valuable and trumps biased reporting/opinions every time.
Pork -barrel politics ! The Electrical/Gas contact for USPS mail delivery trucks is pork barrel give away to Biden's cronies, and congress is paying 6 billion dollars on it! There is no way you can say The post office is not a monopoly!
serf
https://itif.org/publications/2021/02/10/postal-services-6-billion-procurement-its-next-generation-mail-truck-what
In a recent executive order, President Biden called for electrifying the entire federal vehicle fleet, including the 225,000 vehicles operated by the United States Postal Service (USPS), to help drive the clean energy economy. That is a laudable goal, but there’s one big barrier to achieving it. While the president has the means to transform the 420,000-vehicle non-postal fleet, he lacks direct legal authority over the independent USPS. The USPS, for its part, is nearing the end of its own autonomous process dating back to 2015 to award a contract or contracts worth up to $6 billion for its Next Generation Delivery Vehicle (NGDV). One of the options on the table is a gas-powered vehicle. Even though a postal electric vehicle (EV) would cost far less to operate and maintain, and provide substantial societal benefits from reduced carbon emissions and accelerated industry transformation, the gas guzzler’s lower upfront price may be hard for the USPS to resist.
Define monopoly. I believe that UPS, FedEx and even Amazon with its own delivery service would disagree with you. The only monopoly that the post office has is the use of your mail box sitting on the pole in front of your house. By law no one else can use that box for deliveries. The post office is an odd govt agency, separate from tax dollars but governed by the whims of congress. Most of the country still depends on the post office for at least some of their needs. Are you aware that the post office MUST deliver to all areas of the country. There are places where the population density is so low that the other carriers won't waste the time or gas to deliver to. Instead they pay the post office a small portion of their fee to deliver it for them.
The current postal vehicles are beyond their useful life by years. Locally the post office spends an inordinate amount of time trying to keep them serviceable. Oil leaks, gas leaks, heaters that don't work, suspensions shot, and a multitude of other problems brought on by age and nothing but constant stop and go mileage. Also numerous reports of vehicles burning up becomes a hazard both for the carrier and that birthday card you were expecting.
What would your solution be? Borrow money from the fed and replace the vehicles? Keep patching up the old ones at a cost that will eventually exceed the price of new ones? Sit back and watch the old vehicles burn up or crash? Dismantle the post office and deprive those millions that depend on their service? Make some grandma somewhere pay UPS $12.40 to send her grandkids a birthday card? Disband the post office and give a green light for the other delivery services to increase their rates because of not having to compete with the USPS rates? Bob
Can you show me where the USPS receives any form of tax income/support from the Federal govt?
I think I have done that Bob!
The post office is nothing but a boondoggle revenue negative monopoly put on the back of Tax payers for Government retirees to double-dip or even triple dip with government pensions. It needs to be eliminated and let a Amazon/UPS model take over the job of delivering stuff to the consumer.
The junk mail system of flyers is another failed subsided give away that wastes taxpayers money also! Abolish it! Let if fail.
serf
First you call it a monopoly and then you say let the competitors model take over. Are they a monopoly if they have competitors? Methinks you contradicted yourself. Can you name a govt program that isn't a money wasting boondoggle? At least this one provides a service that many use and appreciate.
Do you avail yourself of any govt programs? Social Security, medicare, medicaid, EBT card or any of the other programs that are full of waste and corruption? Did you receive a check or two last year because of Covid? If you did then I suppose because you are against govt boondoggles, out of principle you sent the check back. The post office provides what to some is a vital service and at least recoups some of its costs unlike any of the other govt programs.
What do you have against anyone getting a pension? Is it jealousy? Remember it is congress that has prevented the post office from being able to prefund its retirement program. If they continue to do so and you get your wish to abolish the post office then yes your tax dollars will be used to guarantee those funds. First you complain about waste and spending and then you want to saddle the govt with billions in health care and pensions if the post office is disbanded. You don't appear to be thinking through all of the ramifications of what you say we should do. Bob
A pension in private enterprises is about dead now for the working middle class people unless you have a Union and the government has ruined our fiat money system and the all seeing eye is not going to be able to salvage the present system after the next coming depression. Our enterprise with the new world order is all they got left.
So most if not all safety nets are going to evaporate before our eyes soon. It's inevitable, so as they say “Si vis Pacem, Para Bellum.”
For leaders, it is mandatory. A leader who cannot foresee what may come about in the future is not a reliable leader in times of great emergency.Douglas R. Satterfield
serf
90% of what they deliver is pure unwanted junk that goes straight to the trash or recycle bin. We need to have a mail service that only delivers important and wanted mail, not junk. Imagine how much the USPS budget would be cut if they didn't have to deliver millions of tons of junk every day. At the same time, delete Saturday delivery altogether. They whine about it every time that comes up, but they don't hesitate to not deliver mail on all those 2-bit holidays that the rest of us have to work.
"You invest in a monopoly ran by politicians which it seems to be broke with massive debt and getting credit (Taxes) off the backs of U.S. Citizens"
THIS IS NOT TRUE
1: USPS is not a monopoly, it's an independent agency of the Federal government.
2: USPS is in debt due to the requirements of it's charter to be 'NOT FOR PROFIT' and then politicians placed demands for upfront funding which could not be met within the guidelines of the stamp pricing regulations.
3: USPS is NOT funded by US taxpayers. USPS is only funded by users of the service.
'90% of what they deliver is pure unwanted junk that goes straight to the trash or recycle bin. We need to have a mail service that only delivers important and wanted mail, not junk'
All of the 'junk' is paid (often in advance through pre-payments by major mailers) and in reality, does cover/bolster the costs of delivering First Class mail.
Suspend Saturday delivery? Yes, it's coming BUT does anyone understand that for many US citizens, that mail carrier stopping at their mail box is the ONLY contact with the outside World. It's less of an issue these days but I can remember when many folks met the carrier at the mail box just to speak to another human FTF. Crawl out from under your rock and realize not everyone is(or wants to be like yourself).
You might as well save your breath. I have tried to get some people to understand the points that you make but it was an exercise in futility. When someone goes on a crusade, especially when they are ill informed or close minded, there is no way to change their opinion. The internet is full of opinionated half truths and downright lies that the gullible grasp because it feeds their own biased opinion. Their defense mechanism is to segue to a different subject when they are asked questions that may cause them to give inconvenient answers that contradict the point they were trying to make. Bob
Next for all to see is how corrupt it has become! PRICE CONTROLS. The step to show that Fiat money back by nothing is a house of cards soon to fall and yes the post office is nothing but a postal union ran by politicians to get votes. I can bet you that most post office employees are Democrats.
If the Government needs a dossier mail system for security reasons, then by all means let them fund it.Otherwise, we don't need this system of waste and inefficiency. Actions are louder than words and most politicians have just words like price controls with more stimulus (Socialism) with higher taxes for the middle class.
Have you even wonder why blue states are losing their populations yet? Nope you are blind. The government spending 6 billion dollars for delivery vehicles is a sure sign of a monopoly trying to keep the failing system in place, period.
serf
Anyone remember when the USPS fleet was Ford Pintos and Chevy Vegas?
Including electric vehicle funding as part of postal reform would amount to sanctioning heavy-handed Congressional management of USPS by dictating what vehicles it operates and saddling them with this permanent obligation. Not only should such an electric vehicle amendment be opposed, but the entire “reform” package should be voted down if it has this troubling feature.
At a time when mail delivery is slower than it was in the 1970s, and USPS has major financial challenges, electric vehicle subsidies and corresponding Congressional interference will only make these matters worse, while doing little to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
Nice way of avoiding the questions by switching to union vote buying, some strange reference to a dossier mail system for security, blue state migration and your ever popular fiat money.
The second link with the cut and paste is for the moment moot. Since the funding was tied to BBB and that for the moment is on the back burner due to Manchin and perhaps a couple of others killing the bill. I however do agree with much of the article.
It is strange that you are so against the USPS and its delivery of written material. After all you worry so much about A.I. controlling your life, do you want all communication to be electronic?
Since I will never get you to admit that there is another credible viewpoint that is the opposite of yours, I am done with this topic. I will wait for your next topic that you are worried/enraged/uninformed about. I would wish you a Happy New Year but that might offend you that I think there is a small chance of a few good things happening in 2022. Bob
Well, you should be careful how you throw down the gauntlet. I proved that the government backs The U.S. post office and with all the smoke and mirrors it's still a government run monopoly now. Of course, I am not immune to that I got you moment myself sometimes in debates.
Now back in the day before the internet with the pony express it was very important part of the government but not anymore. If they need a courier for critical papers now, then let them set it up a new way and join the 21st century for people that don't need first class personal letters anymore. A monopoly has no competition, and the government is the worst offender to not having a free & prosper marketplace here in The USA. And it's getting worst everyday up there in D.C.
I have lost more USPS mail tracking items this year then anytime before. Amazon and UPS not at all.
serf