Congresswoman Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-WA) introduced a bill that she estimates will save taxpayers millions of dollars by cutting salaries of Members of Congress, the President and Vice President of the United States by 10%. Let’s follow this bill and see where it goes.
Beutler says:
…her commitment to stopping overspending by Washington, DC that has amassed a $14 trillion national debt, and harmed job creation in Southwest Washington. While families in Southwest Washington’s counties suffer under double-digit unemployment, Congress debates higher spending that will translate to more burdensome taxes on small businesses.
“My friends and neighbors in Southwest Washington have been tightening their belts for years, and it’s time elected leaders in Washington, DC joined them,” said Herrera Beutler. “We’ve voted to reduce our massive deficit by billions in order to create a better environment for job creators – but we haven’t cut a dime from our own paychecks. The savings ought to start with us.”.
Should Postal Management follow the same example? As one reader pointed out in the comments section of this website:
When the post office operated on a break even model it could spend no more than it earned. A balanced viewpoint aimed at core operations yielded a budget that was balanced. It’s mission statement was clear,which was to deliver the mail as expeditiously as possible and as cost effectively as possible! It wandered away from a break even model and incurred massive debt. There was nothing that forced the service do this, nor did anyone outside of the U.S.P.S. bear responsibility for making them do this.They did it to themselves by spending more money than they had.Now to make-up for their shortcomings employees have to suffer from reduced hours and future retirees face reduced benefits and still more will be taken from us! Management should share the burden of poor decisions made and work with labor to solve the service’s problems rather than make the employees the convenient scapegoat for their bad decisions!
When you consider that the postal service,according to a study by the Congressional Research Service in 2010, had 803,000 employees in 2003 and had by 2010 reduced that number to 575000(a reduction of 28%) and yet has a projected budget deficit of 6.5 billion this year is a primary example of their profligate spending philosophy! A 28% reduction in payroll should translate into some sort of quantifiable revenue to the bottom line on their balance sheet, but it has not. Instead they continue to LOSE MONEY! You never hear from “Donahoe and Crew” that they are going to limit executive compensation or freeze purchases of new equipment and plant. If you continue to lose money each year at some point you freeze purchases and try to balance the imbalance not constantly shift blame. Flip Wilson used to say “the Devil made me do it!”or my favorite “a lie is just as good as the truth,if it works!”That been management’s philosophy for a very long time!
When you consider that management regularly gets bonuses for nothing more than doing their jobs in addition to salaries that range in the GS15 range you arrive at one of the basic problems of the USPS,over compensation of management! In the private sector stockholders reward management for making wise decisions that add value to the bottom line, we however reward officials for incurring losses that run into the billions of dollars every year. The model for the USPS’s finnancial operations is clearly flawed! It is wrong to predicate a practice on a business model from private industry.We are not a privately held company,for if we were the shareholders would vote for a drastic change in practice as regards awards for “non-performing assets”!
Postal Pundits are quick to point out how much Postal Employees salaries are costing the USPS. But many address only craft workers and not management. If labor is 80% of the Postal budget and it needs to be cut, ALL salaries should be on the table not just craft workers. Personally, I believe Postal Employees are underpaid (but I’m bias).
Supervisors get more overtime than any of the craft employees per week. It’s a myth that they are salary. They pat their schedules so they get 1-3 of overtime(or additional hours) per day and all overtime for Saturdays. Once the carriers leave the office the opening supervisor has 2-3 hours to handle administrative duties but still hangs for the overtime. The closing supervisors comes in about 8:30 A.M. and for 2 hours does nothing and than collects 2 more hours of overtimes for the closing at 7:00 P.M. These people are always yelling “no overtime” except for themselves. They have Postmasters for every little city instead of having regional postmasters for the district. Good Grief.
Ken Osterlund , Your wrong about investing in new equipment. They ordered these new FSS machines just when the flat volume was dropping. With construction cost it was over one billion dollars. Allegedly They couldn’t pass the required testing so they keep dropping the standards until they did.. I’m sure if you Google FSS & OIG you’ll find some thing.
As for pay the craft were getting 1 or 1 1/2% while some manager’s received up to 25%. One received a $86,000 signing bonus and a $86,000 retention bonus!
It’s not how much money they are making, it’s how well they manage. If they made a profit it would be worth it to pay even more.
Beware that much of the automation is getting old and this management has not been investing in new equipment. So the bottom line looks better than it will be when this equipment stops processing mail.
Vienna Viking
PS 34 years and I get 65,000 and work 60 hrs a week and paid for 40 NO T TIME DOPE
To manager hey dope I am a front line supervisor who gets nothing because you make our goals unattainable and them take your big bonus for doing nothing PLUS your the reson we are going down the tubes PIECE OF CRAP I WILL TAKE MY UNION WORKERS OVER YOU GOOD OR BAD ANYDAY AS MUST WORK FOR THEIR PAY and believe in customer service 39 days and I retire as 90% of upper management SUCKS
Accountability would go along ways to save PO. Vote no for contract. Its not the money. Don’t give up what was negotiated in good faith. We are not bad because we belong to a union. APWU get some friggin balls
to the asshole that makes $126,000, when march 25 comes around i hope its idiots like you that lose your job got out in the real world ang get a job, because your worth $30,000 a year if that
Scab,
The contract is none of your business. We will decide what to do, not you.
Union member
Everyone should be a scab like me. That way we wouldn’t even have collective bargaining at all to come up with a lousy contract.
To the manager that is making $126,000. You are overpaid. The reason that we can’t comprehend your responsibilities is that they are stupid crap that your boss has made up to justify his job. Just like most managers in the p.o., you are an arrogant jerk when you think you are better than craft. We do our jobs dispite your mismanagement.
No need to worry about the Postal Service, or the financial health of the National APWU either, if the “Tentative Agreement” is ratified. The PMG and Cliff Guffy did a fine job over the past 5 months or so working out how they can both extract money out of the hands of APWU represented employees so as to preserve their own little birds nests.
VOTE “NO” ON THE TENTATIVE AGREEMENT TO SCREW YOU!
If you take away the managers who are constantly breaking the contract and costing the PO more money and then pay back all the overpayments made to FERS and Civil Service. That alone would put us well into the black on the finances. Add in taking away the bonuses of management and cutting some of their jobs and the PO would be in the Fortune 500. LOL
I guess that means you dont do shit………….sit in an office and make stuipe ideas up and want workers to do them not even knowing about…………… the job at all………….sounds like postal managment
Post office could save millions ….first have managment read contract….tuff one
2nd have them follow it…..never going to happen just keep wasting money….
My base salary is 126,000. I get a lot more. Good luck to you bozo craft people on decreasing what I earn. I have many responsibilities that you can’t comprehend. I am actually UNDERPAID.
We all have a set yearly wage. When we took that job, we knew how much we were getting. In my opinion, no job on this earth should get a bonus. Just think how much would be shaved through every corporation in this world without a bonus. And no, I have never received a bonus.
It’s been said many times, the fat needs to be cut at the top first!! ALL OF US SHOULD PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT CONGRESS IS DOING RIGHT NOW!!!
VOTE ALL OF THEM OUT IF THEY CAN NOT DO THEIR JOB!! DEMOCRAT OR REPUBLICAN!!
Hell yeah! They should do that at the very beginning, what they care is the number on the paper work to save their ass! . They never thought about how to manage to save from the top to bottom.
The only bonus that management should get is FIRED if they don’t do their job! Being paid extra for doing there job is bull. They are overpaid as it is.
Final a Congresswoman that got it right. Someone with common sense.
If I lived in WA. and her being a[ R] and me a [D-MO] I would vote for her.
Pat is right….but do u have the support to force usps to cut their salaries and perks????
I don’;t think so….the bureacrats in D.C. run the country, not u nor other members of congress….
think about it….where and to whom do u go for info. and help???
God Bless u for thinking like Don Quixote…..
jfa
Few people realize that the Postal Board of Governors meet only 42 days out of the year and receive $300.00 dollars per meeting attended. In addition they have a nominal salary of $30,000.00 per year along with an expense account! How do you justify an expense account for 42 days of work? The U.S.P.S. press releases describes these individuals as “the Board of Directors for the U.S.P.S.” I know of no other company that can sustain operations having their board meet just 42 days out of the work year. They look more like a Q.W.L. circle than a group of directors!
Thank you Jaime Herrera!!!
Let’s cut Congress bennies and see how they like it! Jerks!!!