Why don't the USPS just make stamps .40 and call it a day?

[CatWoman]

one cent here, two cents there.

Just like the price of gas.

We all know they have a set price that they are working toward.

[DS1]

1. no fucking shit

they probably cost themselves a hell of a lot in terms of payroll now that the nation's supply of grannies who haven't switched to email or FedEX have to come down and update their collections to include the 1 or 2 cent rider stamps because their current kits are useless.

not to mention recalling all the old booklets, and on and on

[MissB]

2. Still a deal at twice the price.

If you're talking about stamps and not gas.

[Greyhound]

3. Actually the plan is to make the USPS so unpopular with the sheeple

that they'll go along with the neo-cons plan to give it to UPS. In fact, this is going on in nearly every government agency.
Wait till you have to pay $2 to mail a letter that will take two to three weeks to arrive. Cha-ching!

[underpants]

17. Yeah and what's up with that FLAG on your mailbox

it's like a signal or something. I have it all written down somewhere I swear.

[xultar]

4. When you're doing mass mailings that extra cent becomes expensive

It'll be over 42 cents by this time next year I'm sure.

[kainah]

5. I second that!

It's just too inconvenient to have them at .39 anyway. These days, few people would even bother to pick up a penny and I'd be thrilled to never see another thing selling for x.99. Pennies have outlived their usefulness. And I sure wish a dollar coin would make it in the public marketplace. Go, Sacagawea!

[eallen]

6. They really blew that. 40 cents is 5 for $2, 25 for $10. Nice and easy....

We've been on a prime number for years now. There's just no easy book price for 37 cents, though I do get a chuckle that the books of 18 are the number of the devil.

If the post office keeps going up by 2 cents a whack, after 39 comes two prime numbers, 41 and 43. If that isn't further sign of Nyarlathotep's influence on the USPS, I don't know what is.

:evilgrin:

[soothsayer]

7. They're supposed to base it on actual costs. But they have NO

idea how much it actually costs to deliver letter, actually, so they make big gigantic business cases justifying the increase that are pretty much all guesswork.

[calmblueocean]

8. I love the USPS.

Everyone hates on the Post Office, but where else can you stick a stamp on an inflated rubber ball, write an address on it, and have it get to its destination? I've sent all kinds of mail art, and haven't ever had a problem with them. Even with the hike, it's still cheaper to mail a letter from Florida to Alaska than it is to mail one from London to Newcastle.

[Skittles]

11. I agree

I was a GI brat and have mailed literally thousands of cards and postcards in my lifetime and not ONE has not been received

[myrna minx]

14. I love the USPS too.

I can't believe that I can mail something to alaska for a few dimes and it will get there in days. I think they are remarkable.

[ComerPerro]

15. My only complaint about the postal service

is going there.

Otherwise, I love the mail service.

I just know that if I have to go to the post office, I had better plan my day around it.

Although, I don't place the blame even on the postal clerks. Some post offices are understaffed anyway. And most delays I see in line are caused by the people in line, not the ones behind the counter.

[Greyhound]

25. You don't have to go in anymore. There are a whole set of new services

that your carrier will do for you now. The only people that have to go in are those that have to pick up their mail for some reason (dogs, no mailbox, etc.).

[wrathofkahn]

9. I don't think that they can, by law.

I'll have to go see if I can find it, but I seem to recall that somewhere in their (federally-mandated) charter, they're supposed to be breaking even, not making a profit, even if they were to offset that profit on the next year or whatever. So, someone somewhere with purple fingers has figured out the approximate number of letters that will be sent next year, and just divided that into the projected cost of operation next year, and voila! The new stamp rate. So, even though it would make sense to charge $0.40, take the profit now, and draw against that profit throughout (presumably) increasing costs in 2007, they aren't allowed to do so.


I'll see if I can find a reference on this.




BTW: I'm with you on the price of gas. I strongly believe that we need a $0.001 tax on every gallon of gasoline in this country, just because that 9/10 of a cent really hacks me off!

[catmandu57]

10. You're correct

Also, they can only increase in three cent increments.

[Occulus]

13. I believe you are correct.

I am a postal employee. I work in a distribution center, processing the trays and letters; I don't do parcels or flat-rate envelopes; that's a different bid job in the building.

I'd like to try and explain why the price keeps rising.

It used to be, letters were ALL hand-sorted. We have pigeonhole cases in which letters that aren't machineable are placed. This is a tedious and yet very easy job; so physically easy, in fact, it is considered the "light duty" assignment for injured workers.

I digress.

The machines we primarily use today (called the DBCS, short for Delivery BarCode Sorter) are very sophisticated pieces of equipment. These machines are capable of sorting 35,000-45,000 pieces of mail PER HOUR; that rate depends on the quality of the mail being sorted. Larger, thicker envelopes can and do get jammed up in these machines, and often mangled when they do. Similarly, thin, paper-like envelopes also are easily mauled, and in fact the thickness is a primary consideration when deciding whether or not a mailpiece can be machined.

We also have machines called AFCS's, which stands for Automated Facer/Canceler/Sorter. These are equipped with pattern recognition software; they quite literally read the address and (if readable) spray a barcode corresponding the the address information. This barcode is read by the DBCS machines.

When an envelope is unreadable, a two-bit image of the face of the envelope is taken and the image is sent via a dedicated T3 line to an offsite Remote Encoding Center, or REC site. There, data entry clerks type the addresses into the system in code; this generates information used back at the processing center; that information is used to create a barcode, which is then sprayed onto the envelope, and off it goes.

I've worked on both ends of this system, and it really is as efficient as anything I've ever seen. When the entire system is working properly, it is rapid; 2-3 day delivery is virtually guaranteed. While it is true that mail can become damaged or lost, this is very rare when taken in context with how much mail each distribution center processes on any given day.

Much of the equipment we use in our plant, despite its efficiency, is quite old. In fact, some of it is SO old that it uses actual IO boards in conjunction with barebones i386 computers!

Then there's the newly installed BDS, or Biological Detection System. This was installed in response to the anthrax scare; they test for biological hazards (no, don't ask; I don't know which hazards are specifically tested). If the BDS "goes off" ALL operations cease, the building is evacuated, all posessions are confiscated (including our cash) and we're sent home in smocks. The building gets shut down, decontaminated, and then after a few days we all go back to work.

The electric bill for our facility runs into the tens of thousands of dollars per month.

I don't even want to guess how much it costs to run our facility every month in total, but I can tell you this: if it were not for all these big, expensive systems, we simply would not have reliable mail delivery today. It is simply impossible to process all this mail by hand.

One way USPS could increase its take would be to eliminate bulk mail subsidies. One way the USPS could reduce its costs and increase its reliability would be to strictly limit what type of paper, and what color paper, is to be used. Most people wouldn't like it if that happened, but the simple truth is that the lack of a strict standard for mailpieces all by itself costs the USPS a bundle. I don't know if that aspect has ever been studied, but it would certainly be an eye-opener if it were.

Here are four photos:

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://www.usps.com/news/2002/press/pr03_0115photo.htm&h=1984&w=3000&sz=2526&tbnid=Cpvs86zQsLYJ:&tbnh=99&tbnw=150&hl=en&start=13&prev=/images%3Fq%3DDBCS%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26sa%3DG


The top image is a DBCS, the second is an OCR (Optical Character Reader, which is one end of the data conversion system), the third is a manual letter case, and the bottom is a photo of priority mail sacks.

[kansasblue]

12. 38.0452 .... if they could

I agree Cat!

Just make it a round number. I guess it looks like they are really trying to get by with the odd numbers.

[underpants]

16. IT's the pennies man its all about the pennies and the corporations man

they need to keep the penny alive so they can steal the half pennies from you and all your transactions. That's how they finance their war to keep us under control with floridation and particle board in construction of new homes. I have it all written down somewhere....man.

[CatWoman]

18. you nut

:D

I know the character you're emulating, just can't put my finger on it :D

[underpants]

23. TV yeah TV that is how they train you to comply....man

I buried my TV....man.

Not meant to be any specific conspiracy theorists just one like the guy who hangs out at the nearest laundromat.

The Postal Service is a GREAT fake conspiracy theory topic.

BTW- did you know that in 1993 (I think it was) more people died in Post Offices than in electric chairs. Employees were no longer allowed to bring guns to work effective.....1994 (again I think that is right)

[KittyWampus]

19. you realize the Govt. is making the USPS keep 3 billion in escrow? Guess

who will collect the interest on that money?

The US Govt. That's right, this is just a roundabout way of taxing those who use the USPS so the Govt can have more revenue.

When the USPS makes a profit, it goes to the US Govt.

However,

When the USPS NEEDS money, it must come up with the funds by itself.

[Catherine Vincent]

20. May as well be fifty cents

[cigsandcoffee]

21. I fully agree

Who do they think they're fooling with Wal-Mart style pricing?

[CatWoman]

22. Welcome to DU, Cigsandcoffee

my two favorite vices :hi:

[newyawker99]

24. Hi cigsandcoffee!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast: