In a televised discussion of the financial challenges facing the USPS, APWU President Cliff Guffey defended the union’s Tentative Agreement for a new contract with the Postal Service and reminded viewers the nation’s mail system “is the backbone of a multi-trillion dollar business in this country.“
Guffey appeared in an interview today on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” segment about the viability of the USPS.
The union president said the recently negotiated Tentative Agreement benefits both parties by preserving jobs, providing for more flexible work hours, and bringing work back in-house to reduce profiteering by USPS contractors.
Guffey also reminded viewers that the Postal Service’s financial problems are largely caused by Congress, which in 2006 began using the USPS as a “cash cow” to drain revenue from the mail system, and by the severe economic recession.
The union president faced off against a representative from Citizens Against Government Waste, who charged that the USPS must close facilities and that it failed to address its “workforce problem” in agreeing to a new contract with the APWU. (CAGW is a self-styled “watch dog” group that favors privatizing the Postal Service and is funded by oil and tobacco companies and conservative foundations.)
I am ashamed to be an APWU member.. We were sold out.. I would be willing to take a no increase in pay until things improved but this is just giving away everything we have worked and fought for.. Please read the new contract before you vote.. Don’t believe any of this is good.. It is a way to make all FTR’s part time employees.. I can not afford to take less hours.. All smaller offices and retail offices will have hours cut.. Sure you can be excessed but where will you go?.. You will have no choice but to take what they offer you.. Can you afford to give up 25% of your wages?.. Postmasters in level 18 and below will be doing more of our work.. Who will monitor their hours?.. I can guarantee you that with this contract most of us will lose while management at the top keeps what they have.. The union sold us out.. Read the contract and please vote NO.. Make them go back and get us a better deal.. They are trying to scare us to get what they want.. Now is not the time to cave in…
This contract is a load of crap! Full time regulars going from 40 to 30 hours a week!!? I am just getting by now. If this passes I will have to put my house up for sale. College for my kids….maybe the APWU can give out some nice scholarships with the new dues they will be collecting and new money from all the new apwu health insurance enrollies. If this passes we are all down another class level and the gap between the uper 2% and us just gets bigger. And we will NEVER get back what qwe are giving away. VOTE NO!
HOW DO YOU REALLY FEEL?
FOR ALL OF YOU WHO VOTE ‘YES’ FOR THIS CONTRACT, JUST LIKE ALL OF YOU WHO STILL VOTE REPUBLICANS INTO OFFICE, YOU DESERVE WHAT YOU GET!
WE’RE ALL BEING HAD! REMEMBER THE $5.5B/ANNUM THAT WE ARE BEING FORCED TO PAY? (THIS YEAR ALONE WE WOULD HAVE BEEN $618M IN THE BLACK, MORE IF WE DIDN’T HAVE TO SUBSIDIZE THE BULK MAILERS) OH! HOW ABOUT THE BOGUS $238B DEFICIT PROJECTION OVER A TEN YEAR PERIOD THAT NEVER SEEMED TO ADD UP (SOMETHING SOME USPS MANAGER COOKED UP, I’M SURE). IT’S ALL FOR PUBLIC CONSUMPTION. ALL TO MAKE US LOOK LIKE GREEDY UNIONIST TRYING TO BLEED THE AMERICAN PUBLIC DRY (WE DON’T DEPEND ON TAXPAYER MONEY).
I BET THAT YOU ARE ALL VERY HAPPY THAT WE ARE PAYING FOR ALL THE TAX BREAKS FOR THE VERY RICH IN THIS COUNTRY. TRICKLE DOWN ECONOMICS, THEY SAY? THE ONLY TRICKLE DOWN YOU’RE GONNA SEE IS THE NEGATIVE MONEY FLOW THAT THE RAISE IN YOUR HEALTH PREMIUMS WILL BRING, AND THAT’S EVEN AFTER YOU’VE GOTTEN 3.5% OVER 4.5 YEARS (WHEN PMG DONAHOE PRAISED OUR UNION PRESIDENT AT THEIR NAPS MEETING, I COULDN’T HELP BUT FIND IT SUSPICIOUS).
BUT DON’T YOU WORRY ABOUT ME, THOUGH, BECAUSE I’LL BE OUTTA HERE SOON ENOUGH, ANDYOU CAN TAKE THAT TO THE BANK! BUT I STILL HAVE FRIENDS AND ACQUAINTANCES THAT I GENUINELY FEEL FOR. THEY BUST THEIR BUTTS EVERYDAY. THEY DESERVE A BETTER CONTRACT THAN THIS GARBAGE THAT WE’RE BEING HANDED.
to the douchbag whos working 45 yrs plus and cant take time off to be with his sick wife, YOU are an IDIOT !!! The postoffice NEEDS you????? cmon, NOBODY is irreplacable here bro!!
Married to the PO- CSRS retires get a max of 80% PLUS credit for unused sick leave. This is the only way he will get MORE than 80%, so your comment about not getting anything for his 2000 hrs. is incorrect. I do agree with comments about working past 41 years doesn’t make financial sense but going from what you’ve been don’t for all those years to an unknown is very scary for alot of people and that is why we see alot of people working until they pass away because they are afraid not to. Tell him to join a health club, get/start a hobby he enjoys and stay busy.
You dummies don’t deserve me.
Married to the post office, your husband maxed out 3 years ago. Probably works to get away, has been working for about 3 dollars an hour for 6 or 7 years you have no one to blame but yourselves. Take the full pension and let someone else work you dope.
As for mike mccurdy and the no colas for 5 years comment from 08 thru 10 there was no cola due to no inflation, what about the formula do you not understand?
Maybe we could bring back jimmy carter and get ourselves some 5 % raises.
The new people meaning anyone with less then 15 years in have no clue what we had to fight for over the years, They are all worried about the lay off, that was never a issue! Every contract the employees on the rolls where all grandfathered in…. I repeat always..
They have all fallen to the man with there tails tucked between there asses . You should all be ashamed of how you have let these so called supervisors run you to the ground.
If you say yes to this contract you deserve any and everything that happens to you.
We have given our heart and souls to these people fought hard to get what we have and now you give it all back.
They have told you about all the highlights but you have no clue what is in the rest of the contract. The loop wholes … because your to narrow minded and have your heads up your asses so far you can’t see it.
Go ahead take a $300.00 pay cut each payday.
You think this is all about the new employees coming in think again, it will work its way to you they will make all new jobs in the new format,
I,m on my way out it won’t bother me to bad, but god help you if you have more then 5 years left.
You Feel Lucky Make there Day…..
She did us in with the ohhh they got 3.5% raise in this economy. HE did not or was not allowed to say it was over years and less than 1% a year raise. The media is part of the New World Order of lies and deciet, or stopping the facts!!!!!!!!!!!
Guffy gave up the guaranteed 40 hour work week for the “New” definition of a FTR. For those of us who are still considered the “Old” definition of a FTR, we will still get a guarnateed 40 hr. work week. The USPS will make “Every Effort” to continue to post bids for those of us who are guaranteed 40 hours. BS!!! If the the USPS makes the same “Every Effort” that they’ve been making for Light / Limited duty employees – THEN YOUR SCREWED!!!!! You will eventually have to volunteer to be the “New” definition of a FTR, if you can think that far ahead.
Wake-up, this contract STINKS!
Tell Burrass he is retired and enjoy the nice home we bought him at http://www.williamburrus.com .
I think most of us can agree the present system of congressional intervention into the Postal Service’s affairs is not working. We need to do away with Congress sticking their nose into our business and allowing us to implement a model based on making the Postal Service more successful instead being dictated by politicians who know absolutely nothing about our business yet are allowed to dicate policy. Congress ties our hands, then blames us for failure.
Mr Guffey, I saw and heard you on cnbc. I’m 100% in agreement with you. You have a tough mission ahead of you in making the post office work and in our defense. I salute you!
Defend the service but don’t drink the kool-aid. Not to be an ageist as I’m 56 but if you got your time in get the hell out.
CAGW is way out of line attacking the postal service and the Unions. The postal service is a for profit entity drawing funding from postage revenue and not tax payer dollars. The only government waste facing the postal service are the congressional pre-funding mandates. The APWU is needlessly making concessions to the full time workforce it represents by calling a 30 hour a week job a full time job.The eight-hour day, won long ago, is to be eliminated. The proposed contract allows the postal service to create positions with hours ranging from 30 to 48 hours per week, from 4 to 12 hours per day, with split shifts permitted in smaller offices. Overtime will now start, not after 8 hours, but after 40. Current employees may see 40 to 44 hour weeks, with from 6 to 12 hour days. They may “voluntarily” agree to work under the new definition that applies to new hires. However, if the choice is between being excessed to another facility or accepting a redefined position, many will find themselves forced into these schedules.
I don’t see these kind of concessions affecting the ranks of management employees. For every 5 to 8 bargaining unit employees there is at least 1 management employee in this ratio of bosses and workers. Why so many many employees in management? This is no time for the workforce to give in to the postal service’s demands for flexibility due to the postal officials mismanagement of the business erroneous government oversight committees.
In other words, the “watch dog group” is nothing but a front for large corporations that want to steal everything of value from the American taxpayer. Sort of what Fox “News” is on TV.
Our President’s opening statement should have been, ” The single biggest problem facing the PO is the pre-funding of retiree health care benefits and upping the PO’s payment into workers comp. Without those two burdens we would have turned a profit last year.” He knows this but, he didn’t mention it anywhere in the interview. He could have done better. I think he was a little nervous being on tv. This republican hatchet lady on the other side isn’t very knowledgeable either. Postage rates in countries that have privatized their post offices are all much higher. Cliff didn’t point that out either. Maybe next time he’ll do better. Vote for Obama in 2012. Vote Repubs out of Congress before its too late.
YOU’RE A MORON. I’M SURE NO ONE LOVES AN IDIOT LIKE YOU, “POTTER”.
YOUR HUSBAND IS A MORON ,45 YRS COME ON MAYBE HE JUST DONT LOVE YOU.
Go Cliff go! We are fighting for our livelihood here, Privatization, 75 billion surplus in our retirement, Union busting activities in Wisconsin and Florida.The worst economic and political climate since the Great Depression! Keep me working we can talk about the details over a beer! No major givebacks,deferred better than zero and keeping our health plan and retirement.
As evidenced in the Ver offered-!To management)-20 k ver-Postmasster general no layoffs.
I crunched the numbers here-If I was eligible they are not offering nothing! I.e. fers 1400 hrs. sick leave. 700 hrs. creditable towards reitiement. &7. Higher social security payment, more years in higher postal pension700 hrs. out there? If I wait till Jan,1 2014 I get full credit. f I was eligible they would be advancing me 700 hrs. of paid sick leave and the 2500 they would have matched in my retirement program. 20K! With a contract I decide not the number crunchers!
joethemailman
In response to married to the Post Office. The Civil Service retirement system has always given the employee service credit for unused sick leave. The rules have NEVER changed for CSRS. Your husband should have know that and used some sick leave to care for you. It has never been mentioned there would be a payout for sick leave. Until recently FERS employees could NOT get credit for unused sick leave. Thankfully that has now changed.
Doesn’t pay to work past 41 years. It’s like he is working for free. Read the Civil Service Retirement Guide.
CNBC’s Larry Kudlow, their resident guru, spouts propaganda all the time (randomly watch his show to see). Mr Kudlow’s response to the recent disasters in Japan was that he was glad the ‘markets’ were not affected as badly as the people. What a turd.
What about paying for the 2000+ hours of sick leave that my husband has? he already has 45 years in, so giving him credit toward retirement now won’t help! How about rewarding him for not taking much sick leave? I can remember times that I had surgery and really needed him to be with me but he felt it was important for him to be at work. If he had known then that it wouldn’t be advantageous for him now, the post office could have just done without him!!!
LET’S SEE REGULAR WORKFORCE=NO COLA FOR 5 YEARS(2008-2013), A 1% RAISE NEXT YEAR. CASUALS AND T.E.S=RAISE AND FULL BENEFITS, A PROMOTION TO CRAFT EMPLOYEE IN TIME AND 20% OF THE WORK FORCE.EAS= MISMANAGE THE PLACE, GET A 20000 DOLLAR GIFT TO LEAVE , YEAH NO ONE GETS LAID OFF TOO! SOUNDS LIKE THE REGULAR WORK FORCE GOT A GOOD DEAL TO ME!!?????AND I THOUGHT THE POST OFFICE HAD NO MORE MONEY. THEY MUST HAVE MEANT FOR THE REGULAR WORKFORCE!!
I’m glad Mr. Guffey went on cnbc to defend our case. They are complaining about a 3.5 % pay raise ?? All these big shots in congress probably get raises every year. When they freeze their salaries, I’ll freeze mine. Ps….. give us back our 75 billion you assholes