Hmm.. I wonder if the anti-labor group is talking about pop artist Prince’s 1982 song…Noooo, they can’t be talking about his purple highness’ song.
The Citizens Against Government Waste issued the following press release supposedly “Outraged at USPS’ Lavish Expenditures While Fiscal Outlook Worsens”. But yet the body of the release talks about Unions and a lot of other crazy conclusions.
By the way, “still partying like it’s 1999” may refer to a phrase which means companies who had failed due to excesses in the style or operations.
Businesswire
WASHINGTON — Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today expressed outrage on behalf of taxpayers at new reports of United States Postal Service (USPS) employees using business credit cards for personal travel, to expense adult entertainment parties, purchase personal computers, and pay their mortgages. The Washington Post’s Ed O’Keefe details the contents of the USPS Office of Inspector General’s report, “Over a two-year period, some postal workers used credit cards meant for travel and lodging expenses to buy family members flights to Spain and Italy, purchase Apple computers and make more than 50 purchases at ‘adult entertainment’ stores…All told, the mail agency could have saved more than $600,000 in excessive travel costs during fiscal 2009 and 2010 if it had cracked down on non-compliant workers, the report said.”
The inappropriate expenses occurred even while the USPS posted $8.5 billion in losses in 2010. It is on track to blow past its $15 billion statutory debt ceiling in September 2011 and is threatening to default on some of its financial obligations later this year after posting a loss of $329 million in the first quarter of 2011. The USPS is again lobbying for a change in the way it funds its retirees’ pension and healthcare benefits in order to forestall further declines in its financial condition. However, in 2009, Congress cut USPS’s retiree health benefit payment by $4 billion to address a significant shortfall, and USPS still recorded a loss of $3.8 billion. In addition, members of Congress have stymied the USPS’ attempts to close unnecessary facilities. Postal management is currently engaged in tense negotiations with one of its unions, the American Postal Workers Union. Union representatives have stated publicly that the union has no intention of relinquishing any of its lavish compensation or benefits, which are the most generous of all federal employees. USPS compensation and benefits comprise 80 percent of its total costs.
“Any proposal to tinker with the funding mechanism for retiree pension and health insurance liabilities, which are around $90 billion, is another example of USPS kicking the proverbial fiscal can down the road,” said CAGW President Tom Schatz. “The agency is locked into a smothering cost structure that prevents it from streamlining and restructuring to meet the steady decline in postal volume. The Government Accountability Office stated in April, 2010 that the agency’s business model is obsolete. Yet, postal management tolerate employees who are still partying like it’s 1999. Congress must follow the lead of many other countries, including the United Kingdom, Sweden, and New Zealand, and privatize the postal service,” concluded Schatz.
$600,000.00 for two years, when USPS spends 97,000,000.00 year in travel, private industry would love to have our compliance rate. Why aren’t any of these groups talking about the millions that are paid to OSHA for fines? Yet these same groups complain about the injury compensation costs of the postal service, that money could be saved by investing in an adequate size staffing, machines that don’t purposely injury employees, and of course training
Or North Korea, or Iran, or Iraq….
All these anti labor fools should move to China where unions are illegal.
Priceless!
you liburels are al nuts. unuion is commie and shood bee baned. post ofiss shood be privitize becus socilist is not for Ameraca.
More propaganda from the far right. All they are interested in is to create more wealth for themselves. They will lie, cheat, mis-state all facts in order to blame the P.O.’s and countries problems on working men and women.
They are experts and propagating facts to get the middle class to support their selfish views.
There has been a re-distribution of wealth in this country for the past 30 years. Money that once belonged to the middle class has been trickling up to the point of where there is no middle class left.
Lu,
Fact is postal service is funded by stamp revenue.
Fact is the APWU makes up approximately 25% of labor cost, not 80%.
Credit cards are used primarly management for travel, it is a very small percentage of craft employees that have credit cards, with very, very small limits.
I am a postal worker not a manager, and I have 2 postal credit cards which I use as I perform my job. The people on here who state otherwise are either ignorant or lying.These self-proclaimed postal experts simply make the rest of us appear as stupid or liars. If they insist on speaking for or about me they should speak factually. The public has a very low opinion of us from listening to these dolts. They might also learn to spell and punctuate.
More conservative doublespeak. What they fail to mention is that the EMPLOYEE is responsible for paying those travel card expenses off, NOT THE USPS. So, while it is misuse, it isn’t like they were buying lap dances & iMacs courtesy of the USPS.
Think of it as a short term loan (yes…an illegal short term loan – and they should receive discipline) but to make it sound like these people stole out money outright with the USPS’s blessing is naive at best and an outright lie to support an agenda (privatization) at worst.
Who pays for Tom Shitz expence account?
Funny how these nitwits are concerned “on behalf of the American taxpayer”…THE PO DOESN’T GET TAX MONEY, YOU DIMBULBS…
what the fuck over
It would be very interesting to see the totat costs of management separate from the rank and file. Have you noticed that when management is caught with their hand in the cookie jar , they then love to lump themselves in with us to disperse blame.
Mr Carper can you folks not see a trend! Postal management is totally out of control from top to bottom.
It’s a shame that the postal service do not keep up with the credit cards after employees are no longer in the positions to have them let alone those who have deceased! It’s mot the Union employee wjho have the credit cards, its postal management. I do mot see how the media and other groups who do not know what they are talking about, when they say union employees make up 80% of the Postal income. Management spending money on putting mangement personnel up in hotels,flying them around the United States on a monthly basis, paying for their meals PLUS MONTHLY INCOME, paying outrageous salaries to management personnel also, definitely take a hunk out of the income on a yearly basis. Stop putting the Union down, we are the ones getting the American people their mail on a daily basis. We have fought hard and long to get the measley salary, we get now. Do your homework and compare salaries between the two, and the duties and hours that Management employees work and union employees work. Get your facts straight!!
Postal Management tolerate employees who party like its 1999?? WTF?? Employees do NOT have business credit cards…. POSTAL MANAGEMENT does!! Get rid of the overpaid underworked managers and let the workers do the work that they take pride in everyday!! THEN the post office will start showing a profit!!
The Postal Service DOES NOT recieve funding from the government in the form of tax dollars.
Schatz and those like him are clueless. Anything to get into the media.