• The_Cleanup_Batter@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    “United States Postal Service”

    It’s not meant to be profitable. It is a service. As in: not a product. A service performed by your government. Subsidized by taxes because that’s how it works. That’s why it’s (almost) always the cheapest option when you need to ship or deliver.

    • JakenVeina@vlemmy.net
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      1 year ago

      Also, it WAS profitable, for the vast majority of its history. It only stopped being profitable something like 8-10 years ago, when Congress mandated that (IIRC) pensions had to be funded 70 years in advance.

      • anji@lemmy.anji.nl
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        1 year ago

        It sometimes seems like there’s nothing good in this country congress won’t eventually destroy. The USPS was, and is, mostly an excellent organization. Only sabotage will bring it down.

        • QHC@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Republicans are doing most of the destruction, not Congress as a whole.

      • Aesthesiaphilia@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        I mean, it would be nice if ALL government pensions had to be funded decades in advance. Singling out the USPS was some blatant bullshit though.

        • afraid_of_zombies2@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Why? It would mean a massive pool of money just begging for some cockroach from Goldman Sachs to come around and dump it into mortgage backed securities.

          • notfromhere@lemmy.one
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            1 year ago

            More people are retiring than are replacing them in the work force for one thing. Having pensions paid decades in advance means (in my mind) it smooths out somewhat instead of crashing.

            • afraid_of_zombies2@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              More people are retiring than are replacing them in the work force for one thing.

              I find it more useful to solve problems vs trying to solve secondary effects. If the workforce of the USPS is not expanding then pay the remaining workers more. If you take the same percentage out of their pay you should be able to balance out the retirees. Why shouldn’t it be that way? If a worker today can get ten times as much done as a worker of some point in the past then pay that worker ten times as more.

              Now you don’t have to worry about government money empires that lead to the crazy market conditions that caused the 08 crash.

              • notfromhere@lemmy.one
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                1 year ago

                It took me a while to figure out what you were saying. I think that could work up to a point where automation becomes affordable and replaces workers. To continue the thought, I suppose then we would have to pay the remaining workers ever-increasing wages until the only workers left are ones we can’t yet afford to automate.

                I like that idea but I doubt anyone has the appetite to take that to the natural conclusion, i.e. the CEOs and decision makers would also be automated at some point (my guess is near the beginning).