Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Why Did Republicans Have to Destroy the Post Office?


First let me say that I worked as a mail carrier for over 30 years at the Post Office. I was also a union steward. Postal workers have to labor under extremely stressful conditions created by postal management in their quest to have workers do more in less time. Are postal workers well paid? Thanks to their unions postal workers, they have wages and benefits that allow them to lead middle class lives. Workers everywhere should be able to organize, form unions and win middle class benefits.
Republicans hate unions. They hate the public sector in general. To Republicans everything should be privatized. Republicans love class warfare because it is a war they are winning. They pit non-union workers against union workers by playing the divide and conquer jealousy card. They would love to have Americans working for as little as possible without any benefits whatsoever. Just look at all the senior citizens that have to work until they drop because they can't afford not to.
In 2006, Republicans passed a bill requiring the Post Office to set aside 5 billion dollars a year, to pre-fund retiree health benefits for 75 years. No other agency is forced to do this. This bill started the death spiral for the Post Office. Republicans will not fix this situation. They could very easily repeal the bill allow the money to flow back in but they won't. They hate unions and public workers. It's just that simple. So if you live in some small rural community and your medicine doesn't get delivered anymore, thank your Republican legislature.

No comments:

Post a Comment