COVID-19 is making changes within our society. Many are temporary, but some could become permanent. Day by day we are watching businesses become casualties, changing the face of the United States. Happily, there are things we can do to affect the outcomes.
Every time we buy food or other goods, we cast a vote for which businesses will survive. I hope we will elect to keep the small family-owned places that give our communities their unique character. We need to remember that during this crisis, Most businesses deliver, not just Amazon.
One business that has been delivering for the United States since 1775 is the United States Postal System. It was established by the Second Continental Congress with Benjamin Franklin as the first postmaster general. It continues to be a vital lifeline to small, rural, American communities, and deliver where other services will not go.
The United States Postal Service is second only to Walmart in number of employees in the U.S., yet is seldom listed as such. If you perform an internet search top employers, the results are usually limited to private companies, some of which do not pay a living wage. One difference with the USPS is that it has strong unions, so employees have good benefits and don’t have to get their health insurance from Medicaid similar to thousands of Walmart workers.
Many politicians long have promoted the fallacy that the USPS depends on your tax dollars. It doesn’t. The USPS supports itself with its sales of stamps, services, and other products. It’s as if these politicians couldn’t stand the fact that this American institution was independent and profitable, so in 2006 Congress mandated that the USPS put aside approximately $5.6 Billion extra dollars for future employees health benefits. It was crazy! No other business was required to fund benefits 75 years into the future for employees who weren’t not born!
Next, the Government Accounting Office (GAO) miscalculated the amount needed to fund USPS pensions. The USPS overpaid between $50-75 Billion. It was confirmed by both the Office of the Inspector General and Postal Rate Commission. This money simply should have been refunded to the USPS, which is what Stephen Lynch proposed in April 2011 with House Resolution 1351 and Bernie Sanders with S1853 in November 2011 in the Senate. After struggling with the bad 2006 legislation and the recession that followed in 2007-2009, the Postal Service needs to the level playing field the earlier legislation would have given it.
Instead, seizing the opportunity to drive the USPS over the brink of insolvency, U.S. House member Darrell Issa of California proposed HR2309, which ignored the known accounting error and previous bad legislation. Rather than simply giving the USPS access to its refunded money, the act recommended layoffs and closures. Issa then spread misinformation that the Postal Service needed a taxpayer bailout.
With COVID-19, the U.S. government seems happy to bail out plenty of huge privately-owned businesses, yet opposes helping the USPS, even by simply repealing the bad 2006 legislation and returning USPS money that has made its way into the government’s general fund.
I suspect there are two reasons for this push to crush the 245-year-old U.S. institution. First, president Donald Trump has committed his opposition to allow expanded voting by mail. Without the Postal Service it would be nearly impossible to give all Americans the opportunity to vote by mail.
Second, it would be interesting to see how many of those pushing to end the USPS have stock in other delivery services. Just as some members in Congress sold stocks just before the recent stock market loss, many may be poised to see their stocks in publicly-traded package delivery services rise.
One thing is certain, if we don’t speak up now, our country will lose its independent, not-for-profit Postal Service, and continue to hemorrhage decent jobs. The Founding Fathers considered the Postal Service important enough to include in the U.S. Constitution (Article I, Section 8). They clearly felt we needed this service to bind us together as a country. Americans should realize, before it’s too late, that many rich and powerful elements are willing do whatever it takes to bust unions and leave only low wage “gigs” that lack insurance, so the elements can continue to steal this Nation’s wealth, even if it means opposing the U.S. Constitution.
Take a moment to call your senators and representatives, or, to really drive your point home, mail them letters.