To be more specific this is the transaction taking place (failing to take place, rather): Congress passed a law in 2006 (http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills

To be more specific this is the transaction taking place (failing to take place, rather): Congress passed a law in 2006 (http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/109/hr6407 http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/109/hr6407 ) insisting that the USPS fully fund its pension liabilities by 2043, beginning in 2007 (see SEC. 802. B of the full text). That amounts to a radical restructuring of the USPS's costs (not that doing so is in principle a bad thing, but the implementation of this law is... onerous to say the least). This is basically Congress telling the Postal Service how it should allocate its money, and the Postal Service responding by saying "we can't meet the terms that you've unilaterally passed" by not paying the treasury the sum of money necessary to fund future pension liabilities. This says essentially nothing about the costs of current operations or obligations.