Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > The Post Office Costs Taxpayers Nothing, and Gives Us So Much in
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The Post Office Costs Taxpayers Nothing, and Gives Us So Much in Return
By Jim Hightower [1] / AlterNet [2]
September 14, 2016
Although most of us take it for granted, America's postal service is an
amazing bargain. For only 47 cents, you can purchase a Forever postage
stamp.
Buy one 47-cent stamp, and postal workers will deliver your envelope to any
address in the country by plane, train, bus, boat, truck, car, bike,
pushcart, mule, on foot or all of the above. Stick it on a letter, document
or other missive, and our phenomenal network of postal workers and letter
carriers will deliver it within a few days right to the specific mailbox of
your addressee in any of the approximately 43,000 zip codes covering every
nook and cranny of this vast country. For 47 cents! Also, that Forever stamp
from our public postal service means it's good for first-class delivery next
year, next decade or forever, protecting you from future increases in stamp
prices.
What a deal!
But to really get your money's worth, mail something to someone in this zip
code: 48222.
That's the only floating zip code in the U.S. It's a 45-foot mail boat that
has been a registered U.S. Post Office since 1948. Named the J.W. Westcott
II, this postal boat is the mail box for crew members working aboard the
giant freighters hauling grain, iron ore and other commodities across the
five great lakes. Except for loading at one port, then unloading hundreds of
miles away, these long-haul merchant ships never stop, with crews stuck on
board for weeks.
So the Westcott, based near Detroit, chugs out to deliver letters and
packages as each of the freighters passes by. The skilled pilots of the mail
boat maneuver it right up against a steep steel side of the moving freight
vessels, keeping perfect pace with the big ships' speed.
Then, in a very low-tech (but highly efficient) delivery technique, someone
on the freighter lowers a bucket tied to a rope down to the Westcott. The
mail boat pilot puts a bag of letters and packages addressed to people on
that ship into the bucket, which is pulled back up, and then the little boat
peels away from the freighter. Now that's service!
The official motto of the 48222 zip code is "mail by the pail." It's all
part of our public Post Office's amazing commitment to deliver service to
all, not just the rich and the easy-to-reach.
But look out, for a dealbreaker looms over your post office. A cabal of
corporate predators and Koch-headed ideologues have been scheming for years
to take "public" out of this public agency and strip "service" out of the
U.S. Postal Service. The most effective ploy of these price-gouging
privatizers has been a diabolical Big Lie-a massive PR hoax to depict this
essential public service as a hopeless money loser, sucking billions from
taxpayers every year.
Unfortunately, our lazy media establishment keeps spreading their lie.
Here's an August New York Times article falsely asserting that "the Postal
Service has sunk deeper underwater-net losses for the second quarter of 2016
were $2 billion."
Bovine excrement! In fact, our Post Offices earned $1.3 billion in profit so
far this year, making this year the fourth straight that it has operated in
the black. The discrepancy stems from phony paper losses manufactured by
corporate lobbyists and right-wing lawmakers who've insisted since 2006 that
the Postal Service must prefund retiree health benefits for 75 years in the
future. No other agency and no corporation operates under this absurd and
totally unnecessary burden, which adds billions of dollars in fictional
costs to the agency's balance sheet.
Here's another reality the sloppy corporate media ignores: Our postal
network costs taxpayers zero, for we consumers finance its operations by
purchasing those stamps and other services. It's time to put a Forever stamp
on this public jewel.
Jim Hightower [3] is a national radio commentator, writer, public speaker
and author of the book Swim Against the Current: Even a Dead Fish Can Go
With the Flow [4] (Wiley, March 2008). He publishes the monthly Hightower
Lowdown [5], co-edited by Phillip Frazer.
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Source URL: http://www.alternet.org/economy/what-costs-47-cents
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/jim-hightower
[2] http://alternet.org
[3] http://www.jimhightower.com/
[4] http://jimhightower.com/store/swim_against_the_current
[5] http://www.hightowerlowdown.org/
[6] mailto:corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=Typo on The Post Office Costs
Taxpayers Nothing, and Gives Us So Much in Return
[7] http://www.alternet.org/
[8] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > The Post Office Costs Taxpayers Nothing, and Gives Us So Much in
Return
The Post Office Costs Taxpayers Nothing, and Gives Us So Much in Return
By Jim Hightower [1] / AlterNet [2]
September 14, 2016
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Email
Although most of us take it for granted, America's postal service is an
amazing bargain. For only 47 cents, you can purchase a Forever postage
stamp.
Buy one 47-cent stamp, and postal workers will deliver your envelope to any
address in the country by plane, train, bus, boat, truck, car, bike,
pushcart, mule, on foot or all of the above. Stick it on a letter, document
or other missive, and our phenomenal network of postal workers and letter
carriers will deliver it within a few days right to the specific mailbox of
your addressee in any of the approximately 43,000 zip codes covering every
nook and cranny of this vast country. For 47 cents! Also, that Forever stamp
from our public postal service means it's good for first-class delivery next
year, next decade or forever, protecting you from future increases in stamp
prices.
What a deal!
But to really get your money's worth, mail something to someone in this zip
code: 48222.
That's the only floating zip code in the U.S. It's a 45-foot mail boat that
has been a registered U.S. Post Office since 1948. Named the J.W. Westcott
II, this postal boat is the mail box for crew members working aboard the
giant freighters hauling grain, iron ore and other commodities across the
five great lakes. Except for loading at one port, then unloading hundreds of
miles away, these long-haul merchant ships never stop, with crews stuck on
board for weeks.
So the Westcott, based near Detroit, chugs out to deliver letters and
packages as each of the freighters passes by. The skilled pilots of the mail
boat maneuver it right up against a steep steel side of the moving freight
vessels, keeping perfect pace with the big ships' speed.
Then, in a very low-tech (but highly efficient) delivery technique, someone
on the freighter lowers a bucket tied to a rope down to the Westcott. The
mail boat pilot puts a bag of letters and packages addressed to people on
that ship into the bucket, which is pulled back up, and then the little boat
peels away from the freighter. Now that's service!
The official motto of the 48222 zip code is "mail by the pail." It's all
part of our public Post Office's amazing commitment to deliver service to
all, not just the rich and the easy-to-reach.
But look out, for a dealbreaker looms over your post office. A cabal of
corporate predators and Koch-headed ideologues have been scheming for years
to take "public" out of this public agency and strip "service" out of the
U.S. Postal Service. The most effective ploy of these price-gouging
privatizers has been a diabolical Big Lie-a massive PR hoax to depict this
essential public service as a hopeless money loser, sucking billions from
taxpayers every year.
Unfortunately, our lazy media establishment keeps spreading their lie.
Here's an August New York Times article falsely asserting that "the Postal
Service has sunk deeper underwater-net losses for the second quarter of 2016
were $2 billion."
Bovine excrement! In fact, our Post Offices earned $1.3 billion in profit so
far this year, making this year the fourth straight that it has operated in
the black. The discrepancy stems from phony paper losses manufactured by
corporate lobbyists and right-wing lawmakers who've insisted since 2006 that
the Postal Service must prefund retiree health benefits for 75 years in the
future. No other agency and no corporation operates under this absurd and
totally unnecessary burden, which adds billions of dollars in fictional
costs to the agency's balance sheet.
Here's another reality the sloppy corporate media ignores: Our postal
network costs taxpayers zero, for we consumers finance its operations by
purchasing those stamps and other services. It's time to put a Forever stamp
on this public jewel.
Jim Hightower [3] is a national radio commentator, writer, public speaker
and author of the book Swim Against the Current: Even a Dead Fish Can Go
With the Flow [4] (Wiley, March 2008). He publishes the monthly Hightower
Lowdown [5], co-edited by Phillip Frazer.
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Report typos and corrections to 'corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx'. [6]
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Source URL: http://www.alternet.org/economy/what-costs-47-cents ;
Links:
[1] http://www.alternet.org/authors/jim-hightower
[2] http://alternet.org
[3] http://www.jimhightower.com/
[4] http://jimhightower.com/store/swim_against_the_current
[5] http://www.hightowerlowdown.org/
[6] mailto:corrections@xxxxxxxxxxxx?Subject=Typo on The Post Office Costs
Taxpayers Nothing, and Gives Us So Much in Return
[7] http://www.alternet.org/
[8] http://www.alternet.org/%2Bnew_src%2B
