6 Points Donahoe Left Out of His Bailout Rebuttal

In Donahoe’s Answer to Postal Bailout Criticism, we noted the Postmaster General’s recent article explaining that the U.S. Postal Service’s financial straits are a creation of Congress rather than actual financial losses. But the article omits key points, partly because the Postal Service can’t afford to offend Congress right now with the unvarnished truth.

Here are six more things that ignorant critics in Congress and the news media need to consider about USPS finances:

1) Congressional game: The Postal Service is the victim of a Congressional accounting game. What Donahoe diplomatically labels “prepayment to the Retiree Health Benefit fund” was more accurately described by the Office of Inspector General as using “Postal Service funds to make the President’s budget seem smaller.” (See How USPS Could Bypass Congress on Saturday Delivery.)

2) Real conservatism: Why are so many conservatives criticizing efforts to end the “prepayments” when they also claim (correctly, in my view) that the President’s budget is too large? If they understood the situation, I suspect they would conclude that the truly conservative approach would be to end this shell game that misleads taxpayers about the size of the federal deficit. But that would require searching for the truth rather than sound bites.

3) Reforming the “prepayments” is no longer enough: Although accurate accounting of the prepayments, as assets rather than expenses, would have put USPS in the black in recent years, that no longer seems to be the case. The rapidly declining volume of highly profitable First Class mail is overwhelming the Postal Service’s cost-cutting efforts. USPS must find additional efficiencies to balance its books.

4) Not much light in there: The people who claim that the recent APWU labor contract is a giveaway by the Postal Service are engaged in “rectal-cranial explorations”. (That’s a polite way of saying they’ve got their heads up their – well, you get the point.) As someone who works in the news media, I’m embarrassed by many of the news articles and editorials on the contract, which clearly were written by people who hadn’t bothered to look at the contract or to do even a few minutes of research. The pundits tut-tutted about the pay raises for current employees without noticing the more significant efficiency gains, such as pay-scale reductions for future employees and greater use of part-time and temporary workers. (See Is the APWU Eating Its Young? and Junk Journalism and the Bogus Postal Statistic for more on the groundbreaking contract.)

5) Hypocrites: Any member of Congress who criticizes the Postal Service for not cutting expenses enough is a hypocrite. Have you ever heard of a Congressman supporting the closure of a rarely used post office in his district? Donahoe’s article pointed out cost cuts in recent years totaling about 15% of annual USPS expenses and plans for another 25% in cuts. How many members of Congress have advocated specific cuts in the federal budget that even approach that kind of scale?

6) Penny wise, pound foolish: The Postal Service has foregone some investments that would have easily paid off, such as replacing some of its aging, high-maintenance delivery vehicles and revamping some of its facilities. (See Here's How the Postal Service Can Get Back Its Pension and Benefits Overpayments for more on this issue.) But its cash crisis, brought about by the bogus retiree health benefits accounting, has prevented it in recent years from spending a little money to save a lot more.

Downsizing Diminishes USPS's Role As A Source of Opportunity for Blacks, New Book Says

Downsizing of the Postal Service’s workforce is undercutting the service’s historic role as an opportunity provider for African Americans, according to a new book by a postal-worker-turned historian.

Philip F. Rubio’s There’s Always Work at the Post Office: African American Postal Workers and the Fight for Jobs, Justice, and Equality is “a history of black postal workers, their activism and influence on the post office and its unions, as well as the significance of government employment in the making of the black community.” The book starts in the 19th century but focuses especially on the major role played by African Americans in the crucial wildcat postal strike of 1970.

Especially telling is this passage from an interview with APWU president William H. Burrus Jr.: “'The post office has been unique . . . . We shaped America,' notes Burrus, who warns that 'our country will lose something' without universal service: 'It will also put an end to the relationship between the people of color and their opportunity to climb up the ladder of success in our country. . . . The postal service has permitted millions of African Americans . . . to better themselves.'”

Rubio worked 20 years for the Postal Service, first in the Denver Bulk Mail Center and then as a letter carrier in North Carolina, before heading to graduate school and becoming a professor at North Carolina A&T State University.

The book cites 2008 statistics showing that the USPS’s workforce was 21% African American, 8% Asian American, 8% Hispanic, and more than 37% female.

‘That diversity came about primarily as a result of the fight led over the years by African American postal workers for jobs, justice, and equality at the post office,” Rubio concludes.