Of all the great things that Ben Franklin is known for, the most little know perhaps is his stint as the first Postmaster General of the United States. Maybe a little history was showing when the Post Office had Ben’s own image placed on the standard 1 cent postage of the time. Maybe the 1923 issue 1 cent stamp, that is now worth around $60,000 bucks….sets the thought process to what goes on today!
The current Postmaster General – John E. Potter, says: We cannot compete against the private sector. “We need to close on Saturdays! No deliveries!” Ben Franklin would roll over in his grave! He would probably tell Potter, “Go Fly a Kite – in a rain storm!”
John Potter says it is costing the Government $7 Billion dollars a year because people are using e-mail. Hmmm, we can bail-out GM, but we can’t bail out the USPS? Well, General Potter….we want to see the numbers! We want to see those low sales records for each Post Office! We want to see that you can’t keep several regional offices open even if you are making deliveries on Saturday! We want you to show us your books – for every single Post Office in America and we want to see what their sales figures are on Saturdays! We want to see which Offices are cutting it and which ones are not! We want you to treat these facilities like Wal-marts. Only close the NON-Performers! We want to see the Labor Costs!
How many Postal Workers and their families are going to be affected? How much on average is it going to cost your Postal Workers…..not to work on Saturdays? What happens when business starts to boom again? Are you going to re-open all the offices and resume Saturday deliveries?
What amazes us…..is that two things always happen under poor or visionless management – of virtually anything. The first thing they do is blame someone else (in this case “The computer Age””) and the second is to over react and shut down everything, either waiting too long to do so or not understanding the many unintended consequences of not taking half-meausres first.
Taking the measured approach is either too long in coming or was never considered in the first place. Well, General Potter…..get with the program! You can always throw the baby out with the bath water, but in this case it might be wiser to leave a larger Regional Post Office for each area, open on Saturdays…perhaps two in areas that have concentrated population centers! 2ndly, the overnight Express Deliveries need to continue along the way! Either that or you will be killing your own business plan and handing it over to the competition. Perhaps automating weigh and pay options should have been explored and implemented years ago! What are your plans? Are you going to sub-contract those out to UPS?
We implore Congress to do the right thing for once! Do not fold and let the Bureaucrat take the heat. Try doing something intelligennt and keeping watchdog over one of America’s great and historic Institutions! God Bless you Ben Franklin! You set a high bar…..and now they are trying to lower it!
Old Ben also started the first “socialized” fire department, which is what we still have today. Before that, there were only private firefighters, and if you hadn’t paid them beforehand and your house caught fire, tough luck!
Ben knew that there are several important things that need to be done together as a community, and can’t be done as separate individuals. I am sure that if he saw our fragmented healthcare system today, he would be agitating for a universal, single-payer system. (Like the civilized nations have.)
As frugal as Ben was…we doubt that he would opt for a third CAT Scan to develop a meaningful prognosis. The Post Office is the closest thing to “Infrastructure” that we have as a society. Little doubt John Stuart Mill would have also voted for a Post Office paid for by the Citizenry.