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An Amazon-ian misconception.

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We all the know the United States Post Office doesn’t turn a profit these days and relies on tax payer funds to operate. Since it performs an important public service? I’m not complaining.

We live in digital world where people pay their bills online and communicate through email or text. Gone are the days of postcards, hand written letters and the like.

I admit to missing that… but that’s another blog entirely.

Last week I drove to our local post office and mailed a box of books to North Carolina. Since all that was in the box were books, the clerk told me it would cost $9.59 instead of the normal $28.65. This started a conversation on how expensive it’s become to mail things which led to me uttering a statement I was told in no uncertain terms is completely and utterly wrong.

I said, “It’s a good thing Amazon ships their packages with the USPS, it’s probably the only thing keeping them afloat these days.”

Which is when the postal clerk gave me an extremely dirty look.

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She pointed to the box I brought in and told me if Amazon was shipping a $28 package they would pay the post office roughly a dollar for shipping.

What?

When I asked how that was possible she said the U.S. government signed a contract with Amazon when it first started shipping books back in 1994. Since it was mostly envelopes, the rate was low but… are you ready? Though the contract was renewed in 2013, the price wasn’t raised…. and we all know Amazon ships a lot more than books these days.

So basically, tax payers are subsidizing Jeff Bezos.

The third richest man in the world.

Anyone else see something wrong with that?

😡

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27 thoughts on “An Amazon-ian misconception.”

  2. I think the operative word here is “Contract”. USPS had the opportunity, really the obligation to the American taxpayer, to negotiate a better contract when it was time to renew it, but they didn’t. You can’t blame Jeff for that, his obligation is to his company and the shareholders. Blame the post office.

    Let’s be clear. If I hadn’t seen him standing up behind Trump on inauguration day, all would be right with the world as far as my business relationship with Amazon is concerned. I’m very disappointed.

    Cathy just called to let me know that my niece’s husband died from lung cancer last night. My poor Andrea, I can’t think of anything else to say.

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    1. Very sorry for your loss. Cancer is such an evil thing.
      As for Bezos, I’m just sick of the millionaire… and billionaire, sigh… class getting away with not paying their fair share. Corporate greed is out of control.

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  3. Far be it from me to question decisions made on high, but it appears that destruction of the USPS has been the plan for several years (including the Amazon contract, the requirement to fund the pension plan 75 years into the future, the appointment of Louis DeJoy). The next step is to sell the USPS to Amazon for a very low price since it will no longer be worth much. That will free up Amazon to set delivery terms, sort of the way Uber sets its pricing. Shipping around Christmas? Maybe we’ll raise the rates because we’re busy. Or maybe we’ll raise them the rest of the year instead. Want rural delivery? That’ll cost you. Or maybe we’ll make you go to a pickup site and stop home delivery altogether in rural areas.

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  4. The Republicans want to privatize EVERYTHING. They’ve been salivating over dismantling the post office (which is a GREAT institution, the book rate is fabulous) for years. If the USPS hadn’t been enshrined in the Constitution, it would have been long gone.

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      1. Sorry, but the Post Office used to be profitable and unions had nothing to do with the change. In 2006, Congress and the Bush administration passed a law requiring the then-profitable Postal Service to prepay, over the course of just 10 years, 75 years’ worth of ANTICIPATED (not actual or current) retiree health benefits. No other government agency or private company, however, is required to fund future costs in this backbreaking way. This was the first step in Republican plan to show the USPS as “wasteful government spending” that could then be cut (or privatized).

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      3. It’s probably wise for you not to get into an argument when you clearly are just regurgitating conservative talking points rather than knowing actual facts. The only difference in the USPS healthcare plan versus plans for other federal employees is that the 2006, under the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act, the U.S. Postal Service was mandated to pre-fund its retiree health benefits, unlike other federal agencies and private sector companies, which use a “pay-as-you-go” system. The PAEA was passed by the Republican congress in December (before the Democrats who’d won the midterms took over in January of 2007) and the subsequent lack of “profitability” has since been used by Republicans to justify service cuts and closures; this is a typical Republican tactic, to take a wrecking ball to a government program and then claim “it doesn’t work.” Even Trump’s task force in 2018 acknowledged that the USPS would be profitable if not for the PAEA mandate. So to blame the unions or call the healthcare plan for retirees “ridiculous” is irresponsible, willful ignorance.

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      4. And yet they are billions in debt, and Elon is turning a massive profit. Go back to MSNBD-, let them tell you what to say/do as your critical thinking skills seem to be absent.

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      5. Elon has a massive profit because of his government contracts. The hypocrisy of him taking aim at other government programs is extraordinary. And I already explained why the USPS is millions in debt, but like so many Americans right now, you simply do not want to accept a more nuanced, complicated reality that conflicts with your comfortable, black-and-white worldview.

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    1. Remember this, Musk was able to go retrieve those two astronauts. NASA failed twice. Think what you will, but he is the ONLY person on this planet who could have done that.

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  8. There is a lot of discussion in both our countries about government waste but when were governments ever supposed to be profitable. Their mandate is to look after people, not generate widgets, and people aren’t widgets! That being said, governments and government-run necessary services such as postal service should not be subsidizing for- profit entities. These entities seem to like to take advantage and then crow how wasteful the government is, to turn people’s minds to thinking privatization is the better option. Spoiler alert: it’s not.

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  9. I live in a small town where the PO is right across from the community center and the library and every Saturday afternoon, the Farmer’s Market. It’s a friendly gang that works there and the girl scouts sell cookies and the veterans hand out poppies – I would hate to see it close but I have lived in big cities where the post offices are very badly managed. So I would hope some thought would go into completely dismantling the system. But that seems doubtful doesn’t it? I hope Dud’s jacket is machine washable!

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  10. Just wait till the boys privatize the post office and amazon has to raise the cost of shipping. Or will brick and mortar bookstores make a come back ? The post office does rather well considering all the congressional/political interference in its business operation. Like the way Amazon and other shippers just dump all the holiday and other shipping overflow on the USPS.

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  12. It’s always baffled me why the post office has not been able to turn a profit! I mean, it’s not entirely a surprise as our government has had its hand in there, and you see how well they’ve done with a budget. 😩

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