USPS & Faith Popcorn's Brain Reserve Contracts

In recent news articles, the Postmaster General is being quoted as stating that the US Postal Service has very low cash reserves, that the USPS is in the midst of a financial crisis, and that the USPS may need to raise the price of postage above the rate of inflation just to stay afloat.

Okay, we all know the USPS has financial problems. But after reading the following contract proposals (stamp collectors will be interested in the one starting on page 6) it makes you wonder what the USPS is really spending their resources on:

http://apps.federaltimes.com/projec...f-stamps.pdf

Here's the article that goes along with it (although I think the word "divine" is supposed to read "define"):

http://blogs.federaltimes.com/feder...e-of-stamps/

I live in a small village and we have a post office. Pennsylvania is loaded with many small villages and small towns all located in just a small township. For example The post office is located 3 miles from the farm, however there are a total of 4 post offices servicing our township of under 10,000 people. These are all located less than 5 miles from the farm. In addition to these 4 post offices there are another 8 post offices in other townships less than 8 miles from the farm. That is 12 post offices less than 8 miles from where I live.

It just doesn't make sense to me. I do go to the post office every Monday, mainly just to buy stamps. I seldom if ever meet anyone else in line. I'm not saying they can solve their financial problems by closing some of these but it makes sense.

I don't have any magic answer but they certainly spend money like it grows on trees. Reading that report just tells me they can spend money better than they can manage their business.

I did a fast check. The county is rural and has 70,000 people and 30 full time post office. I doubt the county even has 30 traffic signals.

Exactly. After all, isn't it a given part of "management" to be careful where they spend their money?

I used to have to write reports. Any wasted time or money in a given project could be transformed to look successful by using impressive sounding terminology. It was also used in writeups for project proposals. In reading this document, I'd say I just read one written by report writers with experience in embellishment.

Someone in my wife's family was a post master for a small town in PA. Not only was he a PM but also the postal clerk at the window and the delivery postman for the area. Though he retired a while ago he spent most of his time delivering and his post office was only open for a couple of hours in the afternoon.