A penny?
That was the gist of the about its hike in a first-class piece of mail. This is not a government department, it is non-profit.
Maybe the public affairs USPS people are not in close contact with the people who actually run the operation.
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News for the last year from local postal officials; Saturday service hangs from a thread, and no Saturday service anywhere, looms.
Hundreds of post offices , according to postal leadership.
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Yet the USPS price makers answer these profound challenges with a thundering cent.
Now, the American public will be asked to dig deep into its collective pockets and shell out 45 cents for every first-class stamp instead of 44 cents. But anybody who buys Forever stamp stamps now will never pay any increases in the future.
Postmaster General Patrick Donahue said the “small” increase would help with current expenses. This is postmaster understatement. Fact is there is no smaller increase possible. A one-cent piece is not divisible.
Ah, but there are other increases that net the USPS more money. Domestic letters of 1 ounce or less go up to 45 cents, but added ounces stay at 20 cents. However, there is a 3-cent increase in postcards for a new rate of 32 cents. Canada or Mexico letters will rise 5 cents to 85 cents and other international letters will rise 7 cents to $1.05.
More mailing services like Standard Mail, Periodicals, Package Services and Extra Service also went up.
In all, the USPS price hike was 2.1 percent.
Why so modest? Because federal law holds postal increases to the Consumer Price Index, 2.1 percent is the total allowed this year. That is what the Postal Regulation Commission pronounced on Oct. 18.
In the big picture, the 2012 Integrated Financial Plan looks no brighter. It forecasts $64 billion in revenue and expenses of $67 billion.
More cuts are certain, according to these figures. Legal bars against any big revenue – 2.1 percent is the legal limit – pretty much dictate that the postage service is going extinct.
More than throwing another penny at the issue, postal officials need to take their case to Congress and the president before the crippled postal service becomes unfixable.
Congress will make it a big war.
Good.
This topic – deciding the future of communication – needs a broad stage.
It is not just a penny argument.
