"...I guess we can't have archaic and eat it, too. "
oldbobk , I think you've coined a good one there , my man .
Private business would never run the way the USPS is run. It's a bunch of cushy, tax-payer funded, nice retirement jobs that should have been streamlined years ago.
The only things they usually delivery are bills and junkmail, and an occasional manila envelope from HK.
THey should be running 4 days per week, not 6, at best.
The irony of anyone in the US except the upper crust (which I take no one here belongs to) complaining about "union/government wages" is that they've always been crummy and only tend to get cost of living increases. The problem is that real wages in the private sector have become increasingly stratified despite consistent GDP growth, with most people doing worse in aggregate than even that.
So sure, a private business for this would be run differently in that it shits on its employees, create wealth for a few, and jack up the prices because it's a natural monopoly.
That's what business does now!! Out to f**k everyone, especially employees. In some ways, unions need to make a big comeback-if you work for someone else in the U.S., you get treated like shit, period.
Rich
Attica Attica
I believe most of you are well aware of why these "debt crisis" hit and why it looks like everyone and every country is in debt.
Still, I might put a Youtube link, tons of similar videos available, here´s just one.
Money As Debt
Just because libertarians don't understand how fiat money, or really anything about economics, works don't mean it doesn't. I mean, they've been making the same dire predictions of the imminent death spiral of governments for at least a hundred years or more. Never being right is apparently not something that could stop them.
Well, if I could cast a vote what is going to happen, it´s probably not end of the world or anything like it. But I feel quite certain, that there will be big changes in banking and money system.
I think what some people don't realize is that the banking system is the donkey that pulls the government cart, not the other way around.
For example, when banks fail, they can get unlimited debt financing from the public coffers with no strings attached instead of being repossessed by the lenders (that's us). Privatizing profits and socializing losses is not a mantra that would rest well with most people if they knew how the wealthy elite set up the finance system.
Fiat money is just a way to promote and stabilize growth. That's why recessions are much more rare now than before. Less recession is generally a good thing for the vast majority of folks not living off of financial speculation.
Indeed. Many people here think that for example bailouts for EU countries are for the country itself but in fact the bailout would be for banks...
I don't get it - why doesn't the USPS just get permission to increase rates 20%. They would still be cheaper than UPS/FedEx, for most cases, so they wouldn't loose much business, and it would bring in enough revenue to get back in the black when combined with a few post office closings, and a few layoffs. Normal companies have the flexibility to raise rates to market rates and set staffing levels as needed to remain profitable. Give the USPS these same freedoms, and I don't see how they can fail, except for via straight-up mismanagement by failing to compete. They already have a huge scale advantage over every other delivery service. I also have no problem charging remote mailboxes a yearly fee, based on time to travel there for the local post office, or requiring them to pick up mail at a locked box closer to a main road. Yes, it would be inconvenient, especially for elderly/handicapped/homebody people who don't drive every day, but we've got to make some sacrifices to get things straight again.
It's actually for both, because a collapsed banking system helps no one. But with a standard "bailout" as understood by sane parties, the people doing the bailing out get ownership and possession of what's being bailed out. The financiers here simply want public money to save them, but retain everything nonetheless.
See Iceland, which did the right thing in the end (re-possessed their failed banks, sold assets, re-capitalized successfully).
A lot of public services simply don't work well under a pure profit seeking system. For example, roads. No private company run for profit would be willing to spend massive amounts of money for returns with an extremely long tail. It's not certain such a thing can be bootstrapped on a limited basis either because roads are most useful when there are a lot of them.
It's akin to say a village that has to employ all hands on deck to raise a barn. Using a profit model where the farmer has to make enough profits first to pay everyone usually only means a lot less work gets done in the end. A modern economy that seeks full employment to be globally competitive is actually more like this than the examples of artificial scarcity often used to promote the private system for everything. No one solution exist is the best for everything.
agenthex - I'm not sure how any of that applies to the current post office dilemma. The funding to establish the distribution/collection/payment/routing infrastructure, management/policies/licenses, etc. for the post offices are already done, so there is no gigantic up-front cost and no bootstrapping needed - they already serve every address in the country. The costs are all (relatively) incremental from here - just the normal upgrading of facilities/machinery/vehicles, tweaking policies/labor, etc. I can't think of any good reasons why it is a bad idea to allow them to charge enough to actually cover the costs of running the mail and reasonably control long-term staffing levels, rather than going billions into debt. I don't mind them being a semi-government monopoly (and never stated otherwise), but I do object to the USPS piling up billions in debt when there are much better options.
Many systems, and specifically ones of infrastructure (transport in particular) are simply not conducive to profit (in fact we rarely charge directly nor completely for roads at all). This isn't a statement of ideology, but of how the world works in reality. Given two countries, the one which subsidizes certain industries will gain a material advantage for its citizens in aggregate over another which doesn't. Others might choose differently, but personally I prefer the place with the most material advantages in quality of life, etc.
It's arguable whether mail as communication still fits in that category with newer modes of it available, that's something unfit for generalization and needs to be examined in detail, but I'm just pointing out that such situations exist and it's not so far fetched in this case.
Another way to look at it is that businesses issue new debt all the time (ie. functionally similar to a "bailout"). As an investor, it is wise to buy it or not? That's circumstantial, but it's not de facto flawed on the face of it.
Definitely would be at least one of the Best Case scenarios to proceed like Iceland did. However I don´t see it as the most probable one...
It takes at least tons of balls from government, very low corruption, very low involvement rate in banking "businesses" from leaders and not the least: a good majority of the people (which can be slightly manipulated with media to one side or another). Therefore I don´t see it as the most probable choice, too bad...
Even if letting banks fall when not bailing them out and getting a recession or some bad times, I would be more than happy personally shoveling that mess up (read: less work, more tax etc...) than providing bailout :|
We need to start hanging bankers in public from light poles and voting from the rooftops.