Originally Posted By: CELICA_XX
Originally Posted By: Wolf359
How much government money did they waste?
As I recall, USPS is an independent agency and doesn't get any money from congress although congress tells them what to do.
American taxpayers give an $18 billion gift to the post office every year
http://fortune.com/2015/03/27/us-postal-service/
" ...
Laws that bar any other shipping service from delivering mail and packages directly to residential and business mailboxes. Shapiro estimates that this gives the Post Office a $14 billion annual boost, more than three times what the Postal Regulatory Commission estimates it to be.
..."
In other words, $14 Billion of that $18 Billion is because the Postal Service rents PO Boxes. I suppose that the boxes at UPS facilities that only UPS can deliver to are a subsidy to UPS?
I see that the article's calculation of "subsidies" to the USPS does not count the payments mandated by the 2008 law requiring the USPS to prefund present and future retiree health benefits, a condition that no other federally funded or owned agency or corporation has had placed upon it. Payments are in the order of $5.5 Billion
a month to the US treasury.
The pensions are paid out of general revenue, just like any other federal employee pension benefit. In essence Congress is demanding the USPS pays monies to prepay a liability, but that are simply spent as if they were tax revenue, while placing the burden they are intended to eliminate on the taxpayer's of the future.