7 ms·

It’s also extremely hypothetical. And counter examples on why it won’t work is plenty abound. The concept that market and competition will result in better serv

It’s also extremely hypothetical. And counter examples on why it won’t work is plenty abound. The concept that market and competition will result in better services and price and efficient operations is true only when then there are checks and balances in place. Market collusion, using monopoly power to squish and consolidate power and extort people happen in almost every industry. I do share their concern that govt enterprises can become corrupt or complacent but I don’t share the the view that the solution is privatisation. Our elected government officials are also corrupt, should we throw away democracy?

quickthrowman 6y ago
Agreed, there are no truly free capitalist markets in the US, except maybe black markets. The USPS is damn good at delivering the mail, I don’t trust any private company to treat a first-class letter with the care the USPS generally does. The Post Office actually makes money, but they’re legally required to fund a new hire’s entire projected pension at the time of hiring which lets Republicans point at how the post office loses money when it was done that way on purpose.
- nickff 6y ago
  What you're saying about pension payments is all wrong. They have the same obligation to fund promised benefits as any private company (which is different from government entities), and they haven't been making the payments.[1] [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/2020/04/14/post-office-pensions--some-key-myths-and-facts/#1462ee2d47f5 https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/2020/04/14/post-office-p...
  - coliveira 6y ago
    The situation of pensions is that the USPS is required by a law created by republicans to pre-pay their retirement fund for the next 75 years, something that no company in the world does. Not only this, but the money they pay is being diverted to the general government accounts, so it is possible that in the future the pension money is not there anyway, if the government decide not to provide the money in the future. The law had two draconian results: the USPS has to operate in the red, and the government has additional revenue that facilitated the tax cuts proposed by republicans.
    - nickff 6y ago
      Quote from the Forbes article I linked to: >"FACT: ALL companies are required to fund any pension promises they make to their employees. (The only exceptions are for top executives, who can lose their pensions if a company goes bankrupt, and for entities that aren’t actually “companies” - state and local governments and churches.) NONE of them are permitted to take a “pay as you go” approach but must contribute to a pension fund an amount equivalent to what a worker has accrued that year in benefit promises, regardless of how far into the future that worker will be retiring, and must make up for any shortfalls due to asset losses or other reasons. The USPS and private sector companies use the same general actuarial principles to do so, though there are differences in assumptions, particulars of the calculations, etc."
      - coliveira 6y ago
        The lie in this article is hidden here: "though there are differences in assumptions, particulars of the calculations..." Companies need to fund their pension plans, but only for the portion of time the worker has been employed by them. For example, for FY 2020, the company needs to set aside money corresponding to an additional year of work. But for the USPS, the law requires it to set aside money assuming that the worker will work his entire career for USPS, and project all retirement costs 75 years into the future, even for workers that they haven't even hired yet. In actuary, this is the difference between "actual vested liability", and "total projected liability". The result is clearly absurd. Moreover, this money is not staying in USPS retirement accounts, is going to the government. So it doesn't even guarantee that the money will be there for USPS workers. To add to the injury, USPS is allowed only to invest on treasury bonds, which means that they need to raise even more money than a private company, which is free to invest in any high grade bond. https://www.businessinsider.com/usps-rise-fall-post-office-collapse-2020-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/usps-rise-fall-post-office-c...
    - treis 6y ago
      >USPS is required by a law created by republicans to pre-pay their retirement fund for the next 75 years The USPS is required to pre-pay the pension costs they have incurred. It's not pre-paying the retirement fund for 75 years. It's putting money aside so that you have the money to pay your 25 year old worker the money you promised them when they're 100.
- refurb 6y ago
  The USPS is damn good at delivering the mail That hasn’t been my experience in the least. Terrible customer service, packages lost, packages requiring signatures left on door step. And the best is when my package says “delivered” yet shows up 3 days later.
  - quickthrowman 6y ago
    Thanks for sharing your anecdote, but you left out the rest of the sentence that provides context for the word ‘mail’ when you quoted me. I was explicitly referring to first-class letters, not packages. I believe first-class mail is better left to the USPS.
    - refurb 6y ago
      Meh... I’ve had issues with first class mail as well. My neighbor getting my letters, I even had a letter torn open and the check taken. Turns out it was a postal employee but at least the postmaster followed up.
      - quickthrowman 6y ago
        That’s unfortunate to hear, sounds like you’ve had some bad luck with the USPS. I can see why you took issue with my claim that the USPS is good about delivering the mail, I’d be frustrated if I was you as well.
- AnthonyMouse 6y ago
  > Agreed, there are no truly free capitalist markets in the US, except maybe black markets. Are you kidding? They're all the markets nobody talks about because they're working. Go to the store and buy a chair. There are a hundred different kinds. Any kind you like. The barrier to entry is low. There are many competitors. > The Post Office actually makes money The problem with the Post Office isn't that they don't make money (though having to be bailed out by the taxpayer is unacceptable for any reason, and the pension thing was at the behest of the USPS union rather than the Republicans). The problem with it is that they have a monopoly on carrying mail which prevents customers from enjoying the benefits of competition.
  - quickthrowman 6y ago
    > Are you kidding? They're all the markets nobody talks about because they're working. Go to the store and buy a chair. There are a hundred different kinds. Any kind you like. The barrier to entry is low. There are many competitors. I was operating under the assumption that a market that has tariffs on foreign goods [0] is not ‘truly free’ but perhaps you disagree. [0] https://myhfa.org/tariff-relief-doesnt-apply-to-furniture-from-china/ https://myhfa.org/tariff-relief-doesnt-apply-to-furniture-fr... > USPS problem is a lack of competition Do you expect a private company to service every single rural address that currently receives mail for the same or lower price? We can’t even get ISPs to wire the entire country.
    - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
      > I was operating under the assumption that a market that has tariffs on foreign goods [0] is not ‘truly free’ but perhaps you disagree. But now you're just being pedantic. You could make the same argument about taxes, where some states have higher property taxes so factories there have a competitive disadvantage and so on. But then you can't even make the same claim of black markets because their illegality increases costs. In practice what matters is not whether there is some kind of ideologically pure anarchist vision of freedom which requires no government to exist anywhere in the world, but rather whether there exists competition sufficient to keep margins thin and make companies responsive to customer demands. Which there is, for things like chairs. Some might even say for things like package delivery. > Do you expect a private company to service every single rural address that currently receives mail for the same or lower price? They would surely provide service to every address at a price which pays their costs and a market rate of return. Whether that's lower than the existing price in every single case whatsoever doesn't seem like a very strong argument to hinge the entire existence of the USPS on. Especially when there isn't any obvious reason why that subsidy should be a moral imperative, or if it somehow was why it couldn't be satisfied with an explicit subsidy rather than operating an entire national business as a monopoly just to create an implicit one. > We can’t even get ISPs to wire the entire country. The incumbents that have captured the regulators? Of course not. And they've had regulations put into place to keep anyone else from doing it either. Meanwhile, Starlink.

quickthrowman 6y ago

Agreed, there are no truly free capitalist markets in the US, except maybe black markets. The USPS is damn good at delivering the mail, I don’t trust any private company to treat a first-class letter with the care the USPS generally does. The Post Office actually makes money, but they’re legally required to fund a new hire’s entire projected pension at the time of hiring which lets Republicans point at how the post office loses money when it was done that way on purpose.

nickff 6y ago
What you're saying about pension payments is all wrong. They have the same obligation to fund promised benefits as any private company (which is different from government entities), and they haven't been making the payments.[1] [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/2020/04/14/post-office-pensions--some-key-myths-and-facts/#1462ee2d47f5 https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/2020/04/14/post-office-p...
- coliveira 6y ago
  The situation of pensions is that the USPS is required by a law created by republicans to pre-pay their retirement fund for the next 75 years, something that no company in the world does. Not only this, but the money they pay is being diverted to the general government accounts, so it is possible that in the future the pension money is not there anyway, if the government decide not to provide the money in the future. The law had two draconian results: the USPS has to operate in the red, and the government has additional revenue that facilitated the tax cuts proposed by republicans.
  - nickff 6y ago
    Quote from the Forbes article I linked to: >"FACT: ALL companies are required to fund any pension promises they make to their employees. (The only exceptions are for top executives, who can lose their pensions if a company goes bankrupt, and for entities that aren’t actually “companies” - state and local governments and churches.) NONE of them are permitted to take a “pay as you go” approach but must contribute to a pension fund an amount equivalent to what a worker has accrued that year in benefit promises, regardless of how far into the future that worker will be retiring, and must make up for any shortfalls due to asset losses or other reasons. The USPS and private sector companies use the same general actuarial principles to do so, though there are differences in assumptions, particulars of the calculations, etc."
    - coliveira 6y ago
      The lie in this article is hidden here: "though there are differences in assumptions, particulars of the calculations..." Companies need to fund their pension plans, but only for the portion of time the worker has been employed by them. For example, for FY 2020, the company needs to set aside money corresponding to an additional year of work. But for the USPS, the law requires it to set aside money assuming that the worker will work his entire career for USPS, and project all retirement costs 75 years into the future, even for workers that they haven't even hired yet. In actuary, this is the difference between "actual vested liability", and "total projected liability". The result is clearly absurd. Moreover, this money is not staying in USPS retirement accounts, is going to the government. So it doesn't even guarantee that the money will be there for USPS workers. To add to the injury, USPS is allowed only to invest on treasury bonds, which means that they need to raise even more money than a private company, which is free to invest in any high grade bond. https://www.businessinsider.com/usps-rise-fall-post-office-collapse-2020-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/usps-rise-fall-post-office-c...
  - treis 6y ago
    >USPS is required by a law created by republicans to pre-pay their retirement fund for the next 75 years The USPS is required to pre-pay the pension costs they have incurred. It's not pre-paying the retirement fund for 75 years. It's putting money aside so that you have the money to pay your 25 year old worker the money you promised them when they're 100.
refurb 6y ago
The USPS is damn good at delivering the mail That hasn’t been my experience in the least. Terrible customer service, packages lost, packages requiring signatures left on door step. And the best is when my package says “delivered” yet shows up 3 days later.
- quickthrowman 6y ago
  Thanks for sharing your anecdote, but you left out the rest of the sentence that provides context for the word ‘mail’ when you quoted me. I was explicitly referring to first-class letters, not packages. I believe first-class mail is better left to the USPS.
  - refurb 6y ago
    Meh... I’ve had issues with first class mail as well. My neighbor getting my letters, I even had a letter torn open and the check taken. Turns out it was a postal employee but at least the postmaster followed up.
    - quickthrowman 6y ago
      That’s unfortunate to hear, sounds like you’ve had some bad luck with the USPS. I can see why you took issue with my claim that the USPS is good about delivering the mail, I’d be frustrated if I was you as well.
AnthonyMouse 6y ago
> Agreed, there are no truly free capitalist markets in the US, except maybe black markets. Are you kidding? They're all the markets nobody talks about because they're working. Go to the store and buy a chair. There are a hundred different kinds. Any kind you like. The barrier to entry is low. There are many competitors. > The Post Office actually makes money The problem with the Post Office isn't that they don't make money (though having to be bailed out by the taxpayer is unacceptable for any reason, and the pension thing was at the behest of the USPS union rather than the Republicans). The problem with it is that they have a monopoly on carrying mail which prevents customers from enjoying the benefits of competition.
- quickthrowman 6y ago
  > Are you kidding? They're all the markets nobody talks about because they're working. Go to the store and buy a chair. There are a hundred different kinds. Any kind you like. The barrier to entry is low. There are many competitors. I was operating under the assumption that a market that has tariffs on foreign goods [0] is not ‘truly free’ but perhaps you disagree. [0] https://myhfa.org/tariff-relief-doesnt-apply-to-furniture-from-china/ https://myhfa.org/tariff-relief-doesnt-apply-to-furniture-fr... > USPS problem is a lack of competition Do you expect a private company to service every single rural address that currently receives mail for the same or lower price? We can’t even get ISPs to wire the entire country.
  - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
    > I was operating under the assumption that a market that has tariffs on foreign goods [0] is not ‘truly free’ but perhaps you disagree. But now you're just being pedantic. You could make the same argument about taxes, where some states have higher property taxes so factories there have a competitive disadvantage and so on. But then you can't even make the same claim of black markets because their illegality increases costs. In practice what matters is not whether there is some kind of ideologically pure anarchist vision of freedom which requires no government to exist anywhere in the world, but rather whether there exists competition sufficient to keep margins thin and make companies responsive to customer demands. Which there is, for things like chairs. Some might even say for things like package delivery. > Do you expect a private company to service every single rural address that currently receives mail for the same or lower price? They would surely provide service to every address at a price which pays their costs and a market rate of return. Whether that's lower than the existing price in every single case whatsoever doesn't seem like a very strong argument to hinge the entire existence of the USPS on. Especially when there isn't any obvious reason why that subsidy should be a moral imperative, or if it somehow was why it couldn't be satisfied with an explicit subsidy rather than operating an entire national business as a monopoly just to create an implicit one. > We can’t even get ISPs to wire the entire country. The incumbents that have captured the regulators? Of course not. And they've had regulations put into place to keep anyone else from doing it either. Meanwhile, Starlink.