(MintPress) – Not receiving bills or birthday cards in the Saturday mail is perhaps not the biggest problem on the minds of Americans in the wake of news that the United States Postal Service (USPS) will halt its weekend operations. Yet some are warning that the erosion of the system will have far-reaching consequences, threatening democracy and discriminating against industries that don’t buy their way to delivery.
Take Reed Anfinson, for example. The former president of the National Newspaper Association (NNA) is — and has been — vocal in his opposition to cutbacks in USPS operating days, highlighting the broader concern for those within the newspaper business, and those who rely on community newspapers to keep local governments in check.
Max Heath is also an advocate for six-day delivery. Heath is the postal consultant for Publishing Group of America, Landmark Community Newspapers and the National Newspaper Association, and sees the recent proposal to axe Saturday delivery as an illegal move, as it violates appropriation bills that require the USPS to continue the same service it had in 1984.
“What it is, is a squeeze play in baseball, you might say, or a force play to see that they achieve what it is they think they need to achieve,” Heath told Mint Press News.
The USPS has moved around this, claiming that it will continue to deliver packages, including drug prescriptions and mail to P.O. boxes. But Heath argues that this does not uphold “universal service.”
“If they’re going to provide delivery for some parties, they’re discriminating against others,” he said.
The USPS workers are also concerned over the proposed cuts, as they work for the second largest employer in the nation, behind Walmart. USPS workers, however, are able to unionize and are considered to primarily hold “middle class” jobs — more than half a million of them.
A threat to democracy
In July, months after HR2309 was introduced, Anfinson told Mint Press News that the implications of the bill, which halted Saturday delivery, would have a damaging impact on community newspapers — and, in turn, democracy at its purest level.
“The post office was given a mission in the founding of it. If we were going to have a democracy, citizens need to be informed, and the only way to really inform people in small communities is through their newspapers,” Anfinson told Mint Press News.
In many of those small communities, the USPS is the method of delivery.
Democracy in America is often thought of in broad terms, through Congress and federal legislation. But city and county governments throughout the nation, often in rural areas, have a tremendous impact on the citizens they serve. While reporting in small communities may not be the most glamorous of positions, it’s vital to maintaining and creating an honest government — from the bottom up, according to Anfinson.
This is why Anfinson and others advocated against the passage of the bill that cuts USPS Saturday service, as it provides a delay for community newspapers who rely on the day — and the postal service — to deliver in rural areas.
“If it is fundamental to democracy, then it is beyond simply, ‘What does this cost us fiscally?’” Anfinson asks.
But there’s more to it than that. The fiscal bind the USPS found itself in could have been dealt with in ways they maintained its six-day service schedule.
Why weren’t alternatives explored?
The USPS is not funded through taxpayer dollars, thanks to the Postal Reorganization Act of 1971, passed under President Richard Nixon. Instead, it operates as a semi-independent government organization, gaining revenue through its services.
There is one snag to the system, however. While not operating through government funding, it is mandated by the government to set aside roughly $5.5 billion a year for health care and retirement funds.
Just recently, the USPS reported a $1.3 billion loss in a three month period, wrapping up Dec. 31, 2012. The fiscal crisis it faces is real, but there are varying arguments as to why it has found itself in its current budget deficit.
Under Section 809(a) of the Postal Reform Bill of 2006, the USPS was mandated by Congress to pay yearly between $5.4 and $5.8 billion through 2016. At the same time, the USPS is restricted from raising rates on services beyond the rate of inflation.
According to the Congressional Research Service, the USPS actually made money from 2004 to 2006. Why did Congress feel it necessary to implement the pension program, which would create pensions for employees 75 years into the future?
At this point, that’s the million dollar question — literally.
“We have opposed that consistently and we tried to get that reversed ever since 2008,” Heath said. “That was a budget trick imposed between the Bush Administration and the Congress in 2006 under the Postal Reform Bill, and it was not widely noticed. The thing that bugs us is that no other federal agency is required to do that, so it was a discriminatory trick by the government.”
The USPS is the only government-related industry held to such standards. Without the mandate, it would, operationally, profit $1 billion, according to a 2011 PBS report.
“These ‘prepayments’ are largely responsible for the USPS’ financial losses over the past four years and the threat of shutdown that looms ahead — take the retirement fund out of the equation, and the postal service would have actually netted $1 billion in profits over this period,” the report states.
The new measure, which will likely take effect in August, would save the USPS an estimated $2 billion a year. Yet, there were other options on the table that would have relieved the industry in ways that could have maintained six-day-a-week delivery.
Anfinson and others who advocate against the USPS demise looked to SB 1789, a bill passed by the Senate in April 2012 that would have given the postal service some relief. Under that legislation, the USPS would have received back $11 billion from its $5.5 billion yearly payments made since 2006 to fund its health pension fund.
Heath was part of the lobbying efforts promoting the passage of this legislation, which stopped dead in its tracks when it reached the House.
“Unfortunately, we couldn’t get the House to take it up because the Tea Party views anything that works against the federal deficit as a taxpayer bailout. Well, here’s the way I put it: I say to people, ‘If somebody came up and robbed you of $500 and six months later decided to give it back to you, would that be a bailout?’ And that’s what it was.” he told Mint Press News.
Heath is cautiously optimistic the proposed cuts to Saturday delivery will fall to the wayside, as they have in the past, but recognizes that Congress is more likely to approve it this year, especially through the advocacy done on behalf of Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe, who is calling for his agency’s own cutbacks, despite protests by USPS workers.