Recent Posts

The Spring 2021 Newsletter from Communities and Postal Workers United (CPWU) has articles about Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s ten-year plan, ironically named “Delivering for America”; the “People’s Postal Agenda” discussed at the online conference put on by the Grand Alliance to Save the Public Postal Service; Charlotte postal workers protesting mistreatment and harassment; and Washington state’s postal workers pushing to ... Read More

The mailers were probably disappointed that the Postal Service’s new 10-year plan released yesterday, “Delivering for America,” did not reveal how big of a rate increase the Postal Service intends to make using the new authority it was granted by the Postal Regulatory Commission. While they wait in suspense, here’s a guess: 3.6 percent. We already know that the calculations ... Read More

March 18th marks the day fifty-one years ago when postal workers walked off the job in New York City in what soon became the largest wildcat strike in U.S. labor history. Last March we posted this article by postal historian Phil Rubio, author of Undelivered: From the Great Postal Strike of 1970 to the Manufactured Crisis of the U.S. Postal Service. The ... Read More

With all the attention to delivery delays over the past several months and the Postmaster General’s plans to relax delivery standards — as well as calls for more transparency about postal operations — this seems like a good time to launch a Service Performance Dashboard. The Postal Service itself publishes a useful service performance dashboard, but it shows only quarterly ... Read More

By Steve Hutkins The House Committee on Oversight and Reform has just posted a discussion draft of postal reform legislation in advance of Wednesday’s hearing with Postmaster General DeJoy and the Chairman of the Board of Governors, Ron Bloom. The draft has three main sections — one about creating a Postal Service health benefits program that includes Medicare, one on ... Read More

By Steve Hutkins Earlier this week a group of mailers’ associations continued their effort to convince the DC Circuit Court to stop the Postal Service from increasing rates under the new authority it was recently granted by the Postal Regulatory Commission. The Postmaster General has told the mailers that another rate increase, based on the new authority, is “imminent.” The ... Read More

By Steve Hutkins The Postal Regulatory Commission’s annual compliance review ordinarily focuses on postal rates, but this year, due to widespread reports of mail delays over the past several months, the Commission has been scrutinizing on-time service performance. Over the past few weeks, the Commission and its newly appointed Chairman have filed a number of information requests seeking data from ... Read More

The CPWU Winter 2021 Newsletter has articles about why Postmaster General DeJoy should be dumped, the possible implications of the Senate going Democrat, and the contrast between DeJoy’s vision and what a public vision of the Postal Service looks like. Read the newsletter here ... Read More

On November 30, 2020, the Postal Regulatory Commission issued a 484-page order revising the rate system for Market Dominant products. Under the new system, the Postal Service will be able to raise rates beyond the Consumer Price Index, which it was prevented from doing (aside from the provision for an exigent increase) by the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of ... Read More

By Steve Hutkins Fairhope Courier, November 15, 1961: “Pulitzer Prize Winning Author Visits Spanish Fort Post Office: Harper Lee, author of the Pulitzer Prize winning novel, To Kill A Mocking Bird, chats with Har­mon Hanson (photo above) while admiring his newly opened post office at Span­ish Fort. Miss Lee is a frequent visitor to this area and was de­lighted with ... Read More

By Steve Hutkins The Postal Regulatory Commission has spent the past four years working on a revision of the rate system for Market Dominant products. Yesterday the Commission issued its final rule on the changes. The order is here. The PRC’s press release is here. The media kit contains a useful FAQ. The review of the rate system involved the ... Read More

We’re tracking all the reports the Postal Service has been submitting on service performance, the processing of ballots, and other data being shared in the various lawsuits. The Postal Service’s weekly on-time service performance reports submitted in Jones v USPS can be found here. The daily reports being submitted in Richardson, Vote Forward, and NAACP are here. There have also ... Read More

Twelve lawsuits have been filed against Postmaster General DeJoy, the U.S. Postal Service, and President Trump over issues connected to mail delays and threats to voting by mail in the November election. We’re “live blogging” the latest developments on a daily basis. You can find a list of all the cases at the end of this post here, with links ... Read More

By Mark Jamison In forestry the practice of tree girdling is well known. Although there are some circumstances where this can be a useful practice, in most cases the technique is used for nefarious ends. Girdling involves removing the bark and layers below the bark, usually around the trunk of the tree. The cut, when it includes the entire circumference ... Read More

By Steve Hutkins In response to several inquiries from members of Congress, the Office of Inspector General has issued a report  on “Operational Changes to Mail Delivery.” The report discusses the Postal Service’s plan to eliminate 64 million work hours — the equivalent of 33,000 jobs — by implementing 57 cost-cutting initiatives. As discussed in this previous post, the plan ... Read More