About the Author

Richard Cochrane is trained in chemistry and metallurgy but is far more interested and practiced as a political and fund raising consultant, writer and amateur historian. He grew up in a Navy family and with his two younger brothers carried on its 500+ year tradition of naval service to Great Britain and the USA then enjoyed a career with one of the largest advertising and public relations agencies working with numerous Fortune 500 companies and many of America's premier educational institutions. He maintains friendships and acquaintanceships around the world. He lives in Santa Barbara, California.

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Post Office Wants To Cut Delivery of Less Mail At Higher Costs

January 29th, 2009 • Richard Cochrane
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$100,000 Letter Carriers And Skrocketing Pensions Ignored As Sacred Cows.

The post office was $2.8 billion in the red last year. “If current trends continue, we could experience a net loss of $6 billion or more this fiscal year,” Postmaster General John E. Potter said in testimony for a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs subcommittee.

Total mail volume dropped almost 5% last year to 202 billion items the largest single volume drop in history. Despite annual rate increases, Potter said 2009 could be the first year since 1946 that the actual amount of money collected by the post office declines.

His solution is to cutback on home mail delivery maybe cutting Saturday or Tuesday deliveries; raise postage stamps to 44 cents in May; cut headquarters staff by 15%; and freeze executive pay. The post office has been embarrassed by its practice of doling out generous annual bonuses to tens of thousands of managers despite losing money. But it real problem is a sacred cow — union contracts that promise $100,000 annual costs for a letter carrier by 2010, and crippling pension costs.

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