Strike Debt Bay Area: Here's our full argument for opposing privatization of the USPS

[Fire Walk With Me]

Strike Debt Bay Area ?@StrikeDebtBA

Here's our full argument for opposing privatization of the USPS:
http://strike-debt-bay-area.tumblr.com/post/51987248526/privatization-is-social-cancer-saving-the-us-postal …


Privatization can be defined as the transferring of a business, agency, public service or property from the public/government sector, where the needs of the community are paramount, to the private/corporate sector, which exists solely for making a profit. This becomes a systemic problem when public welfare is falsely determined to be the outcome of corporate profitability. Those with money to invest look for the fastest return on their investments and neglect the long-term health of their communities. As public services are privatized, the price of those services increases, and profits multiply as enterprise capital is liquidated and real wages are cut. Privatization has made executive compensation go through the roof while public schools are shuttered, affordable housing is decimated, and health insurance claims are denied. The active agents of the 1% are infecting the vital organs of society and appropriating their nutrients. As communities are deprived of investment, they face two choices: either put up the community’s capital as loan collateral for continued public services, or lose the services altogether. Since the first choice is only a temporary solution, the second choice becomes inevitable, and the will to resist privatization weakens.

The USPS is a model for all essential public services

One public enterprise that has done an exemplary job of resisting privatization is the post office. This is because the USPS operates on a principle that all essential public services should follow: the Universal Service Obligation - to extend service so that everyone can use it and everyone can afford it. Instead of diverting profits to executive compensation packages and shareholder dividends, those profits have been used to extend mail service everywhere and to keep the price of postage stamps low.

Until 1980, the USPS received revenue enhancements for building new post offices to serve a growing population. In addition, the real cost of a first-class postage stamp decreased. But in 1970, Congress and President Richard Nixon lashed back at postal workers in retaliation for the Great Postal Strike of that same year with the Postal Reorganization Act. When Nixon signed the act into law he declared that henceforth the USPS should be “run like a business” and that revenue enhancements would be reduced to zero by 1976. For four years, minor supplements were paid but all funding stopped in 1980. Remarkably, it is the only agency of the US Government that has to raise all of its operating expenses. Nevertheless, with modest increases in postage fees and by consolidating operations, the post office continued to thrive without assistance. In 2006, however, the Postal Accountability Enhancement Act imposed a crushing burden on the postal service’s financial condition. Since that time, USPS ledgers have been in the red and they’ve had to liquidate their capital to pay the tribute. In 2011, to streamline this liquidation, the Postal Service’s Board of Governors signed a contract with CBRE, the world’s largest commercial real estate agency. The CBRE is now acts as agent in the sale of all USPS properties. It can be easily imagined that this is a sweet deal for CBRE, but here are some details to make its import more explicit:

(More at the link.)