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Friday, April 26th, 2013

Congressman Finally Takes Action To Remove Needless Requirement Bankrupting The Postal Service

Author:     ANNIE-ROSE STRASSER
Source:     Think Progress
Publication Date:     Apr 25, 2013 at 11:45 am
 Link: Congressman Finally Takes Action To Remove Needless Requirement Bankrupting The Postal Service
Stephan:   Finally a Congressperson, Peter DeFazio (D-OR) has stepped up to stop the destruction of the public postal system. The drive to privatize the Post Office is of a piece with the prison and school privatizations. Each is a demonstration that in the America today profit is deemed to be more important than national wellness. DeFazio understands the real life of the country, and the Post Office's vital role in that national wellness. This is the oldest government agency in the country. As I have experienced myself, to this day the Post Office remains a critical network, particularly in rural America. The attempt to privatize the post office should be resisted. Add your voice where you can.

Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR) has introduced legislation to try to save the US Postal Service from its incipient bankruptcy, and he is asking for the public to help him pass it.

DeFazio’s bill would repeal the needless requirement – one no other business or entity must face – that the Postal Service pre-fund 75 years’ worth of employee health benefits. That requirement has hugely contributed to the USPS defaulting for the first and then second time in its history last year. Analysis from 2012 estimated that the USPS would have a $1.5 billion surplus without the benefit requirement.

But DeFazio recognizes that facts alone will not influence his colleagues to take up and pass the legislation, so he has also turned to the White House’s petition platform, We The People, to petition President Obama to take a stand against the health benefit requirement. He also points out many of the other flaws in how Congress has managed the postal service:

About 80% of USPS financial losses since 2007 are due to a Congressional mandate to prefund 75 years of future retiree health benefits over 10 years. In 2012 USPS lost a record $15.9 billion, but $11.1 billion of that […]

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