Recognizing as I do the perils of postal prognosticating, I, nonetheless, am going to stick my neck out in making one postal prediction that I believe will become reality before this year comes to an end.
Here it is: The Bush administration will establish a presidential commission on the future of the U.S. Postal Service. Has anyone actually told me so? Of course not. But there does seem to be a peculiar alignment of the planets and stars that portends such an announcement.
For one, the administration is somewhat dumbfounded over the cost of the postal service’s deferred (some say “unfunded”) retirement-related obligations. Although there seems to be some debate over the exact size, some have estimated that the USPS’ obligations (retirement, debt and negative net equity) now total somewhere in the neighborhood of $100 billion. Had the postal service been an actual private sector company, some say, it now would be in receivership.
It must be disappointing for the administration to note that Congress and the USPS have frittered away the past seven years with practically nothing to show for it. To its chagrin, the administration now recognizes that Congress’ inaction could leave the federal Treasury holding the bag when the USPS faces the necessity to make good on its liabilities.
The president, informed sources have said, already has signed off on a “concept paper” that would establish a commission. While a considerable amount of work needs to be done to define the nature, constitution and goals of such a commission, at least something seems to be under way.
Of course, it would help a great deal if mailers took a little time to urge the White House to move full speed ahead on the creation of a postal service commission, but some in our industry still don’t show any concern over what the failure to address postal reform would mean to thousands of mail-related businesses nationwide.
What they’re waiting for is beyond me. Given the USPS’ current fiscal trends, mailers face the likelihood of successive rounds of postal increases that would exceed the rate of inflation. Unless the USPS’ growth takes off like a rocket, the prospect of funding a $16 billion payment to cover retirement-related costs in 2010 compounds into a very bitter pill that few in our industry can afford to swallow.
GENE A. DEL POLITO is president of the Association for Postal Commerce (PostCom) in Arlington, VA.
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