Pension funds get invested to grow over time so they can meet obligations. 2021 AG Elections . Even though Trump’s allies sold the voter fraud conceit to him to explain his loss of the popular vote in 2016, the issues the USPS faces are far older and deeper than the current tsuris. United States Postal Service FY2019 Annual Report to Congress FY2019 Annual Report ... Debt $ 11,000$ 13,200$ 15,000(16.7)% (12.0)% ... year 2019, the Postal Service recorded a net loss of $8 8 billion Revenues continue to be pressured by the ongoing The United States Postal Service (USPS), the nation’s national mail carrier service, is under increased scrutiny from politicians who are warning that the agency is not prepared to handle the tens of millions of mail-in ballots which are expected to be sent for the November election. $69.6 B. (AP Photo) The United States Postal Service (USPS) lost $5.5 billion last year. $67.3 B. Meanwhile, customers, particularly in rural areas, grouse about service reductions. $65.7 B. When you were, say, 25, would you expect in ten years to have put aside full retirement savings for yourself and your children and maybe even grandchildren? © 2021 Forbes Media LLC. The U.S. $65.2 B. Source: Government Accountability Office, “Unsustainable Finances Need to Be Addressed,” GAO-18-602. USPS’s total unfunded liabilities and debt ($143 billion at the end of fiscal year 2018) have grown to double its … USPS’s Credit Line Is Nearly Tapped ($Billions), USPS is a massive enterprise. Postal Service (USPS) ran a deficit of $3.9 billion. My credits include Fortune, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times Magazine, Zenger News, NBC News, CBS Moneywatch, Technology Review, The Fiscal Times, and Inc. Get. Debt Collectors Sued | States Object to Proposed Fed Banking Rule | States Move to Stop USPS Changes By Lori Kalani, Bernard Nash. Then there’s one additional insult. Aug. 9, 2019 at 10:45 a.m. Los Angeles Letter Carrier Darryl Johnson delivers mail in April. Ultimately, much of it comes down to a scheme that was a subsidy for the Department of Defense—responsible, by the way, for 18% of all on-budget spending in the 2019 fiscal year. Postal Service (USPS) currently owes $99.8 billion in benefit payments to its current and retired workers but does not have the money, and if Congress does not act to fix the problem, the Postal Service may have to “implement contingency plans to ensure that mail delivery continues,” according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO). USPS cut 4.3 million work hours in the last three quarters of fiscal 2019 through attrition and a reduction in overtime. USPS’s Retiree Health Benefits Will Go Bankrupt. During the quarter, three-to-five day on-time service dropped from 87.8% in 2019 to 72.1% in 2020. As previously reported, AG Herring will face … Washington Postal Scene by Bill McAllister. What is certain, however, is that absent a fundamental refashioning of the Postal Service, U.S. taxpayers will have to bail the agency out one day. “The USPS is not in debt. The legislation, which was welcomed by the Postal Service, faces an uncertain future in the Senate. Luckily, the USPS has enough cash to make ends meet over the next few months. That means all pension obligations including those from when the person was in the military and not a postal worker. As planned, the Postal Service reduced its debt level during 2019 by $2.2 billion, finishing the year with $11.0 billion in debt outstanding. USPS’s Total Debt Is Immense ($Billions). USPS: 2019 Pay Dates and Leave Year. The Postal Service reported a loss of $2.7 billion for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30. Retired postal workers participate in federal pension programs and receive health benefits. Postal Service saw a slight increase in package volume for fiscal 2019, after its first quarterly decline in years during Q3, as the agency is being challenged by Amazon and FedEx rerouting packages to their own networks. NEW YORK, NEW YORK - AUGUST 05: A United States Postal Service (USPS) mail box stands in Manhattan ... [+] on August 05, 2020 in New York City. Chart 1. On a typical day, our 634,000 employees physically deliver 493 million mail pieces to 159 million delivery points.”. with Canyon Brimhall. According to its FY2018 Annual Report to Congress, it operates [6] “34,700 Post Offices and [has] 58,000 retail partners and other access points, more than 232,000 delivery vehicles, and 8,500 pieces of automated processing equipment. 1 United States Postal Service, 2019 Report on Form 10 -K, November 14, 2019 (Postal Service FY 2019 Form 10 K). (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images). 1 facts.usps.com WELCOME TO THE MOST ADVANCED, SOPHISTICATED AND POWERFUL NETWORK IN THE NATION. Congress turned the Post Office Department into the U.S. Feb 7, 2020, 10 AM The House of Representatives passed the legislation Feb. 5 with bipartisan support. President Trump in recent weeks has called the Postal Service "a joke" as the agency is experiences delays in mail delivery due to the coronavirus pandemic and financial pressures. on August 05, 2020 in New York City. Even this was minor, though, in comparison to the treatment by elected officials who saddled the agency with “debt and financial disadvantage,” according to an email exchange I had with Philip F. Rubio, a former USPS letter carrier and now a professor of history at North Carolina A&T State University. It is very difficult to stay in business when costs exceed revenues. The agency is also carrying $11 billion in debt and has more than $120 billion in funded pension and health liabilities. Unfortunately, losses are the rule rather than the exception for the agency. And no legislator or president wants that to occur on his watch. As stated in GAO’s 2019 High-Risk update, USPS faces financial challenges that include the following: Poor financial situation: USPS’s overall financial condition is deteriorating and unsustainable. 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011; Annual operating revenue . This sounds like some screwy conspiracy theory. Postal Periodicals and Publications Postal Explorer® (Let’s remember, by the way, that the odds of voting fraud occurring are so low that it’s more likely you’d be struck by lightning or attacked by a shark.). If you’re ever dealt with business finance, this is ludicrous. There is little evidence that the Postal Service can turn its finances around on its own. Tweet . Whether the 116th Congress will take up postal reform is far from clear. This marks 13 years of consecutive losses for the USPS, totaling $77.8 billion. In 2006, a Republican-dominated Congress passed a bill, signed by George W. Bush, that required the USPS to pre-fund, over a ten-year period, pensions for 75 years in advance. USPS reports [4] that it expects costs to continue to rise: “Compensation and benefits expenses are planned to increase by $1.1 billion in FY2019, due to wage increases by $0.6 billion resulting from contractual general increases and cost-of-living adjustments.” The agency also expects its transportation and retiree health benefits expenses to increase by $1 billion. Check out our various publications and manuals to learn more about what the Postal Service can do for you. The Postal Service has a total debt of around $120 billion, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). The net loss for the year was $8.8 billion, an increase in net loss of $4.9 billion … Running an enterprise of this scale necessitates borrowing money to invest in new equipment and technologies. Through FY 2019, the USPS’s operating deficit was nearly $75 billion and, according to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), has long-term unfunded liabilities of $161 billion. It was a way to offload big expenses from federal responsibility to the new agency. The big example is pre-funding pensions, something that many have heard of at this point. This is false; the USPS had a net loss of $8.8 billion in 2019, and its total liabilities exceed $97 billion, according to official disclosures. Chart 4. All Rights Reserved, This is a BETA experience. It couldn’t move beyond letter and package delivery, although at one point there was a postal banking system that helped low-income and rural people. Total revenue was $17.1 billion, essentially flat from the same period one year earlier. Last year, the U.S. At its creation, the modern USPS was required to take on increased pension benefits for its employees who had previously been government employees. Source: The R Street Institute from USPS annual report data. Share. Trump 2019 budget proposes numerous USPS changes Feb 16, 2018, 4 AM President Trump’s proposed 2019 budget recommends ending six-days-a-week mail delivery, potentially idling United States postal vehicles on Saturdays. ), Chart 2. The Postal Service was designed to be a self-funding agency. Its two-day on-time service dropped from 94% to 88.2% from 2019 to 2020. You may opt-out by. Career employees* A major strike by postal workers in 1970 over wages and benefits, even though the law didn’t allow this, started a series of monetary dominoes. Virginia AG Mark Herring reportedly will seek a third term as AG and not run for governor as previously reported. Its delivery fleet, for example, was mostly manufactured between 1987 and 2001 [8], and is prone to breakdowns and expensive repairs. Postal reform is very hard because some stakeholder is inevitably forced to give something up—mailers are loath to swallow large price increases, while postal workers will not accept compensation cuts. Postal Facts 2020 provides the public with information about the Postal Service. April/May/June 2019. The agency’s retiree health benefits are in a far more concerning condition. The new USPS still had to provide uniform service and pricing. Only Congress can rescue the agency. Package volume continued to increase, but only by 0.3 percent. The Postal Service is in dire financial straits because its revenues are insufficient to support its operational costs and liabilities. To understand the postal system’s dire financial straits takes some history. $67.8 B. Instead, you’d start over. To be sure, some of that deficit is due to actuarial factor. The agency has around $120 billion in unfunded debt and obligations, most of which flow from compensation and benefits owed to its significant cohort of employees and retirees. That's about how long the postal service has faced declining mail volumes and a growing mountain of debt. Given that the postal service had been a major employer of veterans, that effectively means transferring a significant financial burden from the Department of Defense to the USPS, according to Rubio. By 2019, it was 496,934, a reduction of over 300,000 full-time employees. Total mail and package volume declined by 3.8 billion pieces or 2.6%. This is a crisis for an agency whose business model all but ensures that its costs will rise annually. The Postal Service has reported its financial results for fiscal 2019 (Oct. 1, 2018-Sept. 30, 2019). Then the Great Recession of 2008 struck, and corporations—which send the vast majority of all mail—pulled back. The Postal Service reported a loss of $2.7 billion for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30. President Trump in recent weeks has called the Postal Service "a joke" as the agency is experiences delays in mail delivery due to the coronavirus pandemic and financial pressures. You include Social Security and Medicare, which are mandatory Lori Kalani, Bernard.. The third-highest ever dealt with business finance, and tech journalist with branches,... Red-Ink tsunami of $ 2.7 billion for the agency ’ s costs Outstrip! Of Representatives passed the legislation Feb. 5 with bipartisan support $ 15 debt! Mail volumes and a growing mountain of debt benefits, and the Senate Service, to run as a business. Looking for ways to remedy this from 2019 to 2020 Letter delivery brought tens... Three quarters of fiscal 2019 ’ s no surprise, then, that Congress has started looking ways. 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