Article from For Liberty by Norm Leahy.
The U.S. Postal Service has a problem with its mail trucks. They seem to be bursting into flames, destroying their contents and injuring drivers.
Vice’s Aaron Gordon reports:
Since May 2014, at least 407 LLVs have been damaged or destroyed in fires, or approximately one every five days, according to documents obtained by Motherboard via a Freedom of Information Act request.
The specific reason for the fires is sometimes impossible for investigators to determine because of the damage. But one reason appears to be the vehicles, which were designed to last 24 years, are now well past their service life.
The Post Office was warned about the vehicles fires in 2015:
“USPS vehicles catching fire is becoming more frequent as the fleet ages and is in dire need of replacement,” the newsletter said. “This is a very dangerous situation and union leadership must educate the membership and monitor managements [sic] compliance with vehicles scheduled maintenance requirements.”
Why has this problem been allowed to fester? Because the Post Office has been losing bill, and currently teetering on the edge of insolvency.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) said the Postal Service’s “financial viability continues to be high risk because USPS cannot fund its current level of services and financial obligations from its revenues.”
The GAO noted the USPS “has lost $69 billion over the past 11 fiscal years—including $3.9 billion in fiscal year 2018,” and the service’s unfunded liabilities and debt “have grown to double its annual revenue.”
A Senate bill sponsored by Susan Collins (R-ME) would provide the USPS with “up to $25 billion to cover revenue losses or operational expenses resulting from the COVID-19 coronavirus.”
The Postal Service requested $75 billion in April, which included $25 billion for modernization projects.
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Those mail trucks should have been designed different from the very beginning. They..are..horrible! Nothing but death traps. No a/c in the summer, no heat in the winter. Would you want to drive something like this yourself? No YOU wouldn’t but someone can?? Get rid of these caskets on wheels and provide the drivers with something that is more efficient in all ways. These folks want to get home to their families in one piece at the end of the day, JUST LIKE YOU.
Mail trucks catching fire is the least of my problems with my local post office. My mail is constantly not delivered on time or lost and never delivered. I say let’s get rid of the postal service all together and contract out postal services.
If you think the post office is bad now, nobody will work for it if it goes to contract. The pay won’t be there for what is expected of them. UPS and FED EX. yeah right. Same problems, different company’s. The P.O. needs reform more than anything,
Amen to that !!!! NO MORE FREE RIDES FOR JUNK MAIL !!!! WE RECEIVE TEN TIMES JUNK COMPARED TO
first class. Weekly Grocery ads ok. But the corporate #10 envelopes contain nothing worth my time.
Just last week caught myself discarding what I thought was junk but contained a settlement check from one
business because of deceptive business practices. The senior citizens DO NOT NEED this s–t.
At least make these corporations enclose a PREPAID RETURN ENVELOPE. That way if a recipient no
longer wants their junk, the returned envelope will cost them “FIRST CLASS POSTAGE” EVERYBODY
WINS. The postal service gets additional revenue, the consumer get satisfaction from the GOTCHA
returned envelop[e. BINGO
I keep all my junk mail and when they provide a self-addressed, stamped envelope, I just pack the letter full of junk and mail it. It will cost them more fore the heavier return and will give them a taste of their own poison by making them deal with the junk.
If you absolutely, positively need it to get there. UPS or FEDEX.
Another good reason to not allow Democrats to have cheat by mail-in ballots for the election
The problem was noted in my economics class in the mid seventies. Our professor was a high level official with USPS. His office was where the carpet was thickest. He referred to the inherent problems as fixable but denial was the political option. He left later to become President of a University. The technology today used properly could fix some of the issues. The revenue generated today is mostly unprofitable. The facilities are obsolete and the service is lacking. The Post Office is not an enjoyable place to go or work? The Brand has lost its luster and is a little dated to say the least…
Any OTHER company that lost $69 BILLION would have gone out of business after the 1st 2 or 3 MILLION but not the USPS. It has UNLIMITED money to waste because the government can just raise taxes and give them MORE of our money to waste. And I wonder why these trucks wouldn’t have ANY of the amenities that they should have? WHY would these poor, overworked, underpaid, under appreciated, slightly above slaves, people have their union fight for pay for every holiday imaginable, the best health insurance and sick leave pay our money can buy, the best retirement at a very early age any workers can have, and the list goes on and on but they never demanded delivery vehicles with the basic necessities? Reality check!!! They’re putting OUR money in their pockets and in the immortal words of John C. Fogarty ” You ask ’em How much should we give? and they only ask for more, more, more”. To line or to lose.
It’s just Another Poorly run business and sorry but I blame the unions . They have people working there that do Not Deserve to be paid and it’s impossible to get rid of them !
It’s just Another Poorly run business and sorry but I blame the unions . They have people working there that do Not Deserve to be paid and it’s impossible to get rid of them !
LOOSING almost 70 billion? in 11 years? There is no WAY in God’s green earth that ANY business (that’s not government?!?) would survive! If they cannot turn profit in the years & years they’ve been around, then they need to be taken over by a private owner or allowed to fold. Taxpayers are not responsible for a business that can’t turn profit.
Drones.Let’s face it, the biggest cost of USPS is the human cost. Much as I hate the thought of the massive job loss, if Americans insist on keeping “snail mail”, they have to automate every way possible – including house-to-house deliveries. After the initial cost of remote controlled mail boxes that could only be opened by USPS delivery drones and the home owner, the cost per piece of mail would drop by orders of magnitude.
They want to raise the rate. We get that. Go ahead. Every ten years, something like that we have a big deal and they raise the rates. Nothing to see, it’s normal.
We rarely send letters via USPS these days. Electronic is the way we get by. No greeting cards sent by us. Sorry Hallmark, you raised your prices too high, too.
The post office has tried to cut out residential Sat deliveries for years in order to reduce prices. Every time they try, Congress has told them that they need to continue the deliveries. No wonder they are loosing money. In addition, they are the only government agency that is required to have a fully funded retirement system. All in all, the postal dept is in a no win situation.
I HAVE A PACKAGE SITTING IN WEST SACRAMENTO AS Your shipment was received at 9:54 pm on June 20, 2020 in WEST SACRAMENTO, CA 95799. The acceptance of your package is pending. TODAY IS JULY 18 LACKS 2 DAYS OF BEING A MONTH THE BIG QUESTION IS WHEN WILL IT BE DELIVERED? BUT ALSO WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ALL OF THE MAIL THEY HAVE RECEIVED SINCE JUNE 20th?
first off we don’t need mail 6 days a weekevery january they have to come up with 6 billion to put into the retirement fund and medical coverage which they don’t have.if you remember some years ago it’s sloogan was “if it fits,it ships” referring to packages they lost the business they lost to ups and fedx years ago.just anothe poorly run government business.i say hire independent drivers.let them buy the trucks at a low cost or use their own vehicles.imagine the money saved on maintenance and insurance costs.pay them a salary and mileage.no planed pensions,instead an ira or k plan.cut service to 4 days or 5 max.pouring more money into a botomless pit is always the answer and 10 years from now it will be worst.
they keep raising rates, and losing customers, they don’t seem to see the correlation between the two. they have an outrageous retirement plan, and half the time, I don’t get my packages, even though they say they were delivered. maybe so, but not to me. I often get somebody elses mail not even on my block. in our neck of the woods, they do use their own vehicles to deliver, but I bet there’s a lot of cheating on the mileage there too.
The problems of the postal service would be completely eliminated if the liberals would stop stealing money from them and making them pay for the medical insurance of employee’s that haven’t even been employed yet and won’t be employed for another 3o or 40 yrs down the road. The fund has accumulated that much of a surplus of funds and they still won’t stop taking from them.