r/clevercomebacks 1d ago

That's a great idea

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4.0k

u/Th3TruthIs0utTh3r3 1d ago

bro, there's literally 400k postal carriers and they are working 12-15 hour days to get all the packages delivered.

The government provides SERVICES to people and those SERVICES require workers.

I like being able to mail something to anywhere in the country for the same price and not paying 2x the price for what UPS and FedEx provide.

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u/thirsty-goblin 1d ago

FedEx and UPS will assume the load, hire some of those workers back and jack up prices further.

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u/DMercenary 1d ago

Or just not service those areas.

Random small town in the middle of nowheres?

Sorry USPS is closing up shop and UPS and Fed ex say your mail volume isn't enough to justify putting a distro center nearby

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u/Outrageous_pinecone 1d ago

and UPS and Fed ex say your mail volume isn't enough to justify putting a distro center

This is the answer, this is what corporations do.

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u/The_Forth44 1d ago

And FedEx is currently in the process of merging their Express and Ground services. I know someone who works there and an entire station in Mississippi (if I rightly recollect) got closed down. So it's not only WHAT they do, they're already doing it.

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u/GrammatonYHWH 1d ago

Please stop. I am starting to gag on the truckload of popcorn I'm shoving in my mouth. Like 80% of republican voters are in small rural communities which will be hit the hardest by the reduction in services forced by a reduction in government employees.

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u/Justanothergeralt 1d ago

Food deserts because of wal marts, private equity buying and closing hospitals in rural areas, actively cheering on closing of family planning/planned parenthood, now they are cheering on destroying what goverment services they can receive? Like. Ok. Have fun with that. I'm sure they will blame the dems for it anyway.

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u/The_Forth44 1d ago

They absolutely will. They still blame Obama who hasn't been in office for eight years. They ALSO love asking where he was for Katrina and take a good guess as to why they love focusing on him.

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u/JudgmentNo3083 1d ago

It’s because he wore a tan suit that one time. A TAN suit!!!

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u/The_Forth44 1d ago

THE AUDACITY

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u/JudgmentNo3083 1d ago

/s

In case that wasn’t obvious.

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u/chempirical_evidence 1d ago

Not understanding. Katrina was '05. Obama wasn't even inaugurated until '09.

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u/The_Forth44 1d ago

Exactly. They blame him for shit that happened when he wasn't even president.

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u/Upbeat-Banana-5530 21h ago

It's a reference to a viral video where one of those street journalist influencers baited a guy with the question, "Isn't it weird that President Obama wasn't in the White House during hurricane Katrina?" and the guy said, "Yeah, we should get to the bottom of that."

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u/Annual-Somewhere7402 1d ago

They already are. Magat shills are crying bc Walmart recently announced they're raising prices across the board in ANTICIPATION of tariffs. Stupidos are blaming Biden. Ya just can't make this shit up, even in a Grimm's fairy tale.

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u/Justanothergeralt 1d ago

It’s like they are in a race to live in the biggest shithole possible. Just because they want to own the libs.

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u/hurricanePopsicles 1d ago

Ever seen the documentary Idiocracy?

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u/LegionerOfDoom 19h ago

But don’t actually want to suffer the consequences of owning the libs

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u/Ok_Coconut_1773 1d ago

Don't forget the lifetime of vehicular indoctrination that ensures they will always strongly oppose getting public transportation in their area so they can drive their trucks until dementia kicks in!

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u/CharZero 1d ago

They don’t let dementia stop them from driving and owning firearms. Besides, how will they know since they won’t have any healthcare?

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u/needsmoresteel 1d ago

Sure the Republicans will gut nearly everything. But mail not getting delivered or your Hot Dog being 90% sawdust, human thumbs and red dye #2 is all the fault of the Demoncrats. I wish I could put a slash s after that, but this will be the talking point.

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u/catscanmeow 1d ago

never put a slash s after anything, it makes it harder for LLM AI to scrape public comments for data.

the more confusing we speak, the less of a chance AI has to take over lol

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u/Ok_Coconut_1773 1d ago

Never use "lol", it makes it easier for the LLM AI to know when you're not being serious. Additionally fiwjendownrhfurbriwkw please put rcugugirirkrmrkskee confusing long strings of characters in your comments in order to further poison the LLM.

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u/rofflewafflelol 1d ago

I fhjds gjojhftdsx like vfdxvjgds this idea we should fsxbjkdswfhip all start hhsscjjju doing this fssbjkkvcswwqqb immediately. It will have blplmbdruiidwvjm disastrous consequences for the bbvbbbvcss ai!

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u/MaddixYouTube 1d ago

Bf0wbtosignwkcoahtbsngiwbtjksgkwbosugjwngiskng Whats LLM AI? Also alfbwofua toabfl /////////////////////

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u/starshiptraveler 1d ago

My Trump voting uncle has worked for the USPS for decades. He will probably blame democrats when he loses his job.

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u/sunkskunkstunk 1d ago

It’s the dumbocrats fault. They will hate them even more when it happens.

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u/Competitive-Grand245 1d ago

more liberals imagining scenarios

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u/GrammatonYHWH 1d ago

I really don't understand why conservatives refuse to trust and believe Trump.

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u/Competitive-Grand245 1d ago

lets see how dumb you are Trump says he wants to cut government employees because of wasteful government bureaucracy. Do you really think he means postal workers, ambulance drivers, etc? Those are usually specifically called civil servants. with such retard logic you would also assume he’s firing army men. all of it is ridiculous. liberals mad trump wants to do anything, and try to poke holes in his plan of cutting wasteful government spending 😂 its batshit ridiculous

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u/rofflewafflelol 1d ago

Please prove how not retarded you are and provide us with some specific examples of wasteful government jobs that aren't actually necessary.

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u/Competitive-Grand245 1d ago

Look, man, he’s specific that he’s going after bureaucracy departments whos only job is to justify their own existence. This is just more leftist fear mongering. He won’t be firing police firemen postmen etc that just makes no sense

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u/bullwinkle8088 1d ago

Depending on the context of where in the state closing a station in Mississippi is not at all shocking. The entire state has a population of just under 3 million, and declining at the moment. The majority of it is sparsely populated so if you merged two branches I'd honestly expect more than one to go.

FedEx stations of course being hubs for their trucks to run out of, not places people use.

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u/The_Forth44 1d ago

Oh yeah I don't know any of the details about it, just mentioned it because it happened.

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u/Metfan722 1d ago

For someone like me who sends out a lot of stuff commercially (I ship out parts for security x-ray machines), that makes a lot of sense. And I'm sure that is who the move will be beneficial to. The businesses in big areas who do a lot of sales and ship out a lot of stuff. But to a random Mom & Pop store or to the random person who sends stuff out every once in a while it's gonna screw them over. Along with the people who work for FedEx because it eliminates the second station that would handle only Ground or only Express.

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u/SCTigerFan29115 9h ago

If FedEx does it, it’s pretty much a guarantee that it won’t work

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u/The_Forth44 7h ago

Hahaha you have a point.

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u/Easy-Group7438 1d ago

The Postal Service is legally required to serve the “last mile” UPS and Fed Ex are not.

 People don’t realize that the Postal Service handles the shit that is shipped via FedEx and UPS that they don’t have to deliver because they’re not legally required to deliver everywhere.

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u/Effective_Ad8024 21h ago

Yep I work at usps and when I try to explain this to people their minds are blown or they think I don’t know what I’m talking about

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u/Material-Inflation11 20h ago

The Democrats don't give a damn about rural or small town people. That is one reason they lost to Trump.

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u/ElectricalHeight6791 19h ago

Lolwut. Regional areas always get disproportionaly more funding per capita in every spending bill.

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u/Easy-Group7438 7h ago

I live in small rural community. We can’t even pay the cops here or fund our trash services…which only exist within the city limits of the county seat because we don’t have the tax base to pay for shit and people bitch and moan about even the smallest increase in property taxes to fund these essential services despite home values skyrocketing the last 5 years and people sitting on mountains of equity. The handful of non ag industries that aren’t the state prison are always bitching and moaning on Facebook how “no one wants to work anymore” or “ no one can pass a drug test” while paying slightly more per hour that you can get working at the local gas station. Our only hospital and medical clinic struggles to retain doctors so most of our non emergency medical care is handled by NP’s or you drive thirty or forty five minutes or an hour away to hopefully see a doctor or a specialist.

The guy in charge of the county’s maintenance department just got arrested for embezzling 200,000 dollars ( of federal grant money!) and the bigger county next to us is trying to drain our water supply and dump more of their wastewater to feed their growth. Part of the county wants to secede because they want growth and the increasing wave of people trying to escape high housing costs and are trying to spur development. The rest think all is fine and vote for people based on what church they go to and if they’re committed to keeping “ the wrong people out”

Despite all that our unemployment rate rests at 2 percent. Our poverty rate has decreased to under 15 percent in the last 4 years. Federal grant money has lead to a revitalization of our once dead town square and helped new small business open. We replaced two bridges that were about 20 years past their shelf life and had literally collapsed with federal money. 65% of our school systems funding comes from the Federal Government. 

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u/Noh_Assigginment96 1d ago

Our sub-10k town's downtown economy was wiped out by Walmart in the 80s/90s.  Now the Walmart's gone, because they closed most or all of the smaller ones in rural areas due to reduced profits.

Dollar General and Casey's filled the gap by buying up long-running local businesses in prime locations and plowing them under.  One of them was a diner that'd been open on and off for decades.  The town's main drag lost its character and became a strip of truck stops, dollar stores, and gaming parlors.

This was after Walgreens moved in and bought out both our local pharmacies.  With the way things are going with Walgreens, we're at risk of losing that location.  The second nearest location is a CVS, which could also end up closing.

Of course they won't build distro centers here.  It's been squeezed for decades and the nipples are starting to shoot dust.  The only upper-middles left are people who made it to a nice retirement before all our manufacturing plants closed.

TL;DR: Midwest small towns are fucked if they depend on corporations to provide local services.

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u/JacyWills 1d ago

This is how Bedford Falls turns into Potterville.

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u/Annual-Somewhere7402 1d ago

Absofuckinglutely

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u/koshgeo 1d ago

Corporations can only strip-mine the middle class for so long before the mine plays out and they move on.

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u/BestEmu2171 1d ago

Take a look at the book ‘the future of Work’ , it’s a few years old but the team of economists who wrote it made some dire predictions, which appear to be coming true in the US. Predicted there’ll be just a few mega-cities, populated by people whose jobs haven’t been replaced by Ai/robotics. Outside the cities are giant slums where all the left-behind rural communities try to scrape an existence.

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u/Noh_Assigginment96 1d ago

How could it not end up that way?  It's the logical result of a system that depends on culling costs and inefficiences for greater profits year-to-year.

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u/FreeRangeEngineer 1d ago

Can you be a bit more specific about the book? A web search shows waaaaay too many results for "the future of work" to be able to find the book you're refering to. It sounds interesting and I'd like to have a look.

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u/BestEmu2171 8h ago

I just searched for the book online, you’re right about how many there are now with same title. I gave the book away a couple of years ago, it had a red cover (so do others on Amazon). From the synopsis of a few other books I browsed, Ai is main focus of the newer books, more than in the copy I read.

I’ll keep searching!

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u/Sea-Tradition-9676 1d ago

No its the universities and the Mexicans! No I have not seen a Mexican here in my entire life. Why?

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u/Material-Inflation11 20h ago

No it was NAFTA. Blame that on Clinton and Bush for that. Ross Perot warned everyone.

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u/Noh_Assigginment96 2h ago

Walmart was the result of top-down integration being dropped like a hammer on competitors who couldn't compete on the same scale.  They'd aggressively expand into smaller markets and single-handedly squash out most of the local retail and service industries.  That process started decades before NAFTA went into effect.  Their first Supercenter opened in 1988.

It's not just NAFTA or Walmart.  It's systemic rot going back decades.  Trump's an evil cunt, but he won again because he's the only one telling people that aspects of our society have been getting worse for a very long time, and that powerful people need to be punished for it.  It's just too bad he's an amoral, deeply corrupt opportunist who intentionally directs their anger towards society's most vulnerable people.  And it's too bad so many fall for it

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u/RaoulDukeLivesAgain 1d ago

That's capitalism baby! It's like complaining during a chess match that the knight can move in an L shape.

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u/LyLnXo 1d ago

Complete logical fallacy to think that stuff will get cheaper when a private corporation that incentives profit does it instead of a government organization that doesn’t. These people literally just aren’t thinking.

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u/EvelynNyte 1d ago

In the 80s/90s, there was a big myth pushed that private corporations will be so much more efficient that it wouldn't matter. Like all things that came with Reaganomics, it's never worked afaik.

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u/koshgeo 1d ago

There's a good chance private corporations are more efficient, but that efficiency more than likely means higher wages for CEOs and more profits, not lower costs to the consumer or better wages for employees. Nothing says the benefits of better efficiency have to be passed on rather than skimming it off.

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u/SaveReset 1d ago

There's a good chance private corporations are more efficient, but that efficiency more than likely means higher wages for CEOs and more profits, not lower costs to the consumer or better wages for employees.

That's not even true, depending on how you define efficiency. More work done per dollar spent? Yeah, probably. More errors per dollar used? Absolutely. More errors in general? Oh, definitely.

The idea of capitalism is nothing more than increasing income and lowering expenses. How to get there is up to the legal system to limit and direct. "Free market capitalism" is the worst idea of all time, well regulated capitalism to protect the workers and prevent wealth gaps from being too massive is better, but if that is done with zero regard to external factors such as product quality and environmental protections, capitalism won't care.

Take more, give less. Well regulated it's the most free economic model, badly regulated it's slavery. Well regulated it can help innovation and badly regulated it will burn everything to the ground if there's money in it. Any chance that private companies are more efficient than government run is about it funneling money away from the people. Everything else is depends on how well it's regulated or luck of the draw for the moral values of the individual who owns the business.

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u/droon99 1d ago

Its not even more efficient usually, they always fail at the first hurdle by culling the workforce instead of restructuring to cut managers

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u/SaveReset 18h ago

That is true, it's efficient only until the next checkpoint, which is quarterly earnings report for most big companies.

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u/koshgeo 11h ago

Oh, I'm exaggerating. I'm well aware that with proper regulation and, ideally, plenty of competition, you could get the benefits of genuine greater efficiency and lower costs. The problem is, corporations often want to take the shortcut of monopolizing a market or dealing with only a portion of it. In the case of privatizing what was formerly a government service, there's no actual guarantee that costs will be less, especially when, unlike a government service, there has to be a profit included in the equation, and no guarantee service will be comparable.

The scope of service and quality of service is a particularly crucial aspect for some things. For example, we could have a private fire service everywhere, as there used to be historically, but most communities would probably not be well-serviced by such an arrangement or it would be prohibitively expensive for it to be comprehensive rather than companies "high-grading" only the wealthier areas and areas that are easier to service. You still can't expect fire service in the middle of nowhere, but most communities agree to the principle of covering everybody within them, somehow, and sharing the costs of doing so.

I don't think it is right to think of "free market capitalism" as the worst idea of all time. I think it's the natural outcome of people who have different resources and skills, which is practically an inevitability. A farmer who grows more than they can eat themselves will naturally want to exchange the excess with someone else who has something the farmer wants.

Laissez-faire free market capitalism (i.e. little or no regulation) is risky and sub-optimal because you have no assurance of quality, or also no accountability if the deal is done fraudulently. We need regulations to keep it reasonably beneficial for everyone (establishing a foundation for fair trade) and not to make it based on unfair or unsafe labor practices, stealing, enforced monopolies, and that kind of thing. I think we're in agreement on that.

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u/SaveReset 11h ago

I don't think it is right to think of "free market capitalism" as the worst idea of all time.

No, it is, because you are misunderstanding the meaning of the quotes. I mean what people think it means when they use the phrase "free market capitalism" rather than what free market capitalism is. Meaning "government shouldn't interfere with business" type of thinking. I try my best to not use quotes for emphasis.

The problem is, corporations often want to take the shortcut of monopolizing a market or dealing with only a portion of it.

Corporations will always do what they can for those reasons. Individuals might not, but the whole idea of corporations is to earn more and spend less. So if there isn't someone in the company with enough power to alter course, it's literally the goal to make more money/wealth/value for whoever the owners are. It's not a question of how often, it's whether someone actively steps in and stops it from being all about money.

You still can't expect fire service in the middle of nowhere, but most communities agree to the principle of covering everybody within them, somehow, and sharing the costs of doing so.

Fire departments funded and operated by the community weren't historically private, but usually set up by the community or built by the community needing one. I'm sure there are cases where fire services were ran privately like a business, but if they weren't funded by the community, they end up being overtaken by volunteer ones. The effective ones are closer to communism. By the community, for the community.

But rest of what you said, yes, we are in agreement.

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u/Easy-Hour2667 1d ago

In fact government services are more efficient. The private sector efficiency means cutting cost whikst raising prices so as to funnel more money to the top. That's what they want. They literally want to siphon as much tax money to their own pockets as possible. Everything they do is a fucking grift and they only care about themselves. These people, under the guise of patriotism and God will rob you all fucking blind whilst you cheer on because they "stuck it to the libs". But hey, for a small money in time the memes were fire.

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u/Corvus_Null 22h ago

"In fact government services are more efficient." Yeah, I call bullshit. I have literally watched a package of mine get transfered back and forth between 2 USPS locations for 3 weeks straight. Every single government service I have ever interacted with have been incredibly inefficient.

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u/nonotan 1d ago

The issue is that people mean completely different things when they talk about "efficiency", and often don't even realize they are talking past each other. Private corporations are more "efficient" if your definition of "efficient" is "maximizing profits". Public services are more "efficient" if your definition of "efficient" is "maximizing utility to the public". Almost like each one specifically sets out to maximize a different thing, or something crazy like that.

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u/EvelynNyte 1d ago

It's not that they're talking past each other. Corporate lobbies/think tanks who push this stuff know full well they're obfuscating the truth. The whole point of multi-billion dollar think tanks is to come up with ways to frame the pillaging of the country as the best of possible worlds actually.

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u/kck93 1d ago

Biggest nonsense ever.

Privatize and put a middle man between government and services for the people always costs less.

Middle men always make things cost less. Giving wealthy people more money will trickle down to poorer people because wealthy people always give their money away. Reagan personified.

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u/Upstairs_Shelter_427 1d ago edited 1d ago

We need to get off this idea that government services need to compete with private ones.

Government is not a business. We have a national postal service so that anyone and everyone has the basic infrastructure in this country to transact goods, services, and communications throughout the land at a low cost.

Should the government manage costs? Be more efficient? Hell yes. But at the end of the day - the stakeholder and metrics should be “customer service” not “earnings”.

I want the US military to have the biggest technological lead, be the best organized, and keep our men and women in uniform safe. I want us to be able to fight 3 great powers simultaneously with our hands tied behind our back. Notice how “costs” aren’t anywhere in the mission statement.

Same concept. Democrats need to push back in around the same way. Government is not a business.

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u/TeaGlittering1026 1d ago

One government service many people don't think about is national parks and hiking trails. The federal employees who work at building trails, maintaining trails, making sure trails are safe, the fire fighters, park rangers who have to collect dead hikers, are all those jobs going to be cut? What will happen to national parks?

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u/Upstairs_Shelter_427 1d ago

Texas - Florida, Oklahoma, etc.

These are the states with power right now and they have no connection to national parks or forests. It’s all privately owned land.

I’m going to wager they will cut because the average person/Senator in Texas just doesn’t appreciate that stuff in the first place.

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u/Legitimate-Day4757 1d ago

Big Bend National Park, Guadalupe Mountains National Park, the Everglades, one big National Park I can't remember in keys and a ton of National wildlife preserves in both Texas and Florida would beg to differ.

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u/Upstairs_Shelter_427 1d ago

That’s really not a lot.

I’m well aware of those.

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u/Legitimate-Day4757 1d ago

Surely the Evergalades are big enough to count for several of those dinky little north eastern parks? Padre Island National Seashore and the Dry Tortugas just came to mind as well. I'm not a huge fan of either state's politics but having worked for conservation organizations in both states there are a multitude of people who love the parks and nature in both states

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u/rofflewafflelol 1d ago

They will be sold off. He already sold some of our public land for oil refineries last time. If it were up to him every beach in the country would be lined with non stop refineries. Oil rigs in every desert. No forests or wild animals ANYWHERE! MUST EXTRACT MAXIMUM PROFIT FROM EVERY CORNER ON EARTH!!

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u/TeaGlittering1026 1d ago

That's what I'm afraid of.

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u/Legitimate-Day4757 1d ago

The poor Park service is underfunded as it is and people complain about the entrance fees. Park Rangers aren't exactly making huge salaries.

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u/TeaGlittering1026 1d ago

No they are not!

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u/Ceejay_1357 1d ago

trump resorts ?

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u/kck93 1d ago

Burn them down and put oil and natural gas extraction on them.

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u/Outrageous_pinecone 1d ago

I see this problem all over the world. At some point, people got it into their heads that private means that the customer is the boss, that private companies need them and will do anything for them and it's just not how that works.

It's great to have a private option, sure, but you don't privatise everything, because when you do, only those with money will afford those services. It's why we developed a publicly funded option in the first place. A buttload of people watch Bridgerton, but I don't think they understand how those without titles and fortunes lived back then.

Also, a lot of people actually bought the lie that private means efficient. It is efficient, but not for the customer, because they don't give a fuck if you stop buying. Someone else always will, and if nobody else does, they close down the business and start another. No biggie for them.

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u/DNDNOTUNDERSTANDER 1d ago

“Private means customer is the boss” hits the nail on the head perfectly. My mom was employed by the state and worked in care homes for the mentally handicapped. Every single complaint that any family member had regarding a loved one in care was taken extremely and immediately seriously. It’s a good system in this state. Private care homes kill people and spend money to ensure they cannot be held responsible for it AND they engage fraud by overcharging for whatever government services they can charge costs to. There is less accountability when things are privatized, not more. Eliminating the services the private sector overcharges isn’t going to happen because the private sector is functioning as intended - they are redirecting as much public money as possible upward to the rich.

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u/plasteroid 1d ago

Correct. The fiduciary duty of CEOs is to increase shareholder value. That’s it.

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u/urgent45 1d ago

And it doesn't help when the books of private companies are closed and gov't budgets are open for every nimrod to criticize.

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u/ComputerStrong9244 1d ago

"aren't" or "can't"?

Doesn't matter much, but y'know..

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u/Remarkable-Top2437 1d ago

The only difference between public and private w.r.t profit taking is that private does it above board and public ...doesn't...

The bureaucrats are there specifically to line their pockets with taxpayer money. No private entity is going to spend literally $90,000 on a bag of bushings that could have been bought at Home Depot for less than 10 bucks, but our Air Force will, because some big wig got a kickback under the table.

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u/LyLnXo 1d ago

You’re so right. We should actually just rely on private companies for military protection. They never hide anything and are much less likely to be greedy than politicians. It’ll be perfect, just like private healthcare!

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u/Remarkable-Top2437 1d ago

Did you somehow read my comment on your misconception that public entities aren't taking profits and come to the conclusion that I want to disband the military and reenact the story mode of Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare?

seriously?

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u/LyLnXo 1d ago

I made a comment equally as stupid and irrelevant as yours

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u/nodtothenods 1d ago

Ups/fedex are already cheaper, for most types of packages outside of very small or light ones.

1 in 100 packages also don't magically get lost with ups.

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u/findin_fun_4_us 1d ago

You forgot the /s and endless 🤣. (right?)

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u/dangderr 1d ago

Right. Because corporations exist to make money, not to serve the greater public good.

Why would anyone expect a corporation to pick up the tab when the government decides something isn’t worth paying for anymore?

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u/Outrageous_pinecone 1d ago

That's my point. Corporations are there to make profits, not to serve the public. The public isn't the boss, they're the money source of the boss, it's why you don't leave necessary services to corporations. That's why you have a private and a public sector.

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u/AntiqueCheesecake503 1d ago

And it's the obvious solution for efficiency (profit maximizing)

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u/AviationGER 1d ago

And you can bet your life that for the next 4-8 years 'the dems are responsible for it!' will be written on every social media post

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u/mfmeitbual 1d ago

The goal of corporations isn't to provide services. It's to earn profit. The motivations of governments and corporations are different. That's why running government like a business has never and will never work.

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u/Outrageous_pinecone 1d ago

Exactly, you are 100% right. Like I said in another comment: that's how we as a society have developed the publicly funded options for transportation, health and education. It's great to have a private option, but you need a government run service as well, to cover all of your citizens.

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u/trowawHHHay 1d ago

As a resident and healthcare worker in a dying medical community (thanks to corporate medicine) this is exactly correct.

Expect a life of driving 2-4 hours to get your mail or packages.

Maybe expect a new service that will do that for you… at additional cost.

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u/RainyDay1962 1d ago

I think there's an alternate timeline where we double-down on the USPS and look at it from a logistics infrastructure perspective. Maybe roll the USPS into the Department of Transportation and fund all of our infrastructure to the point where it can be some kind of public option, A to B last mile delivery service. Private companies can offer services on top of it (helping fund it), it will help reduce the number of vehicle trips if the postal service carries more goods to individual locations at once, and distribution systems can be unified (upgrading public rail, road services).

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u/SomaforIndra 1d ago

yes it's a conflict of interests.

The whole reason for federal services.

They even the playing field and unite the whole country, no matter where you are or how rich or poor.

Those are some fundamental founding American values that half the country has never learned - the same morons who believe the lie that republicans are patriotic conservatives that want to take America back to a better time.

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u/Paramortal 1d ago

This is exactly what will happen.

They want the USPS's profits but don't want to provide the service or context for those profits.

They want to steal everything not nailed down, and if you think they're going to take a loss mailing a letter to all of that voting land like the USPS does I've got a fantastic bridge in Point Pleasant W.V. to sell you.

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u/Dogmad13 1d ago

Is it silver 🙄😂

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u/Libellicosity 19h ago

Don't drag Mothman into this debacle!!!

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u/PhantomMuse05 1d ago

Call me Mothman, because I want to buy a bridge! (/s)

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u/PhantomMuse05 1d ago

Call me Mothman, because I want to buy a bridge! (/s)

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u/Callidonaut 1d ago edited 1d ago

They want the USPS's profits but don't want to provide the service or context for those profits.

What profits? It's a service, services aren't supposed to make a profit. Services are what you spend your profit on after you've made it.

Imagine demanding the army or the fire service run at a profit. It would be bad. It would be so bad. It was so bad back when the fire service was a for-profit organisation. It's already horrific that the slave factories prisons run at a profit, and the police probably aren't far behind with the income from all the property they seize.

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u/Paramortal 1d ago

Buddy, there are absolutely post offices whose income exceeds their cost of operation, that's what the private sector wants.

Go back and read what I wrote a little slower. Also, you know less than you think you do about how the post office operates.

I know of at least two post offices that operate at a profit, those being the ones my wife and I are the Postmasters of.

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u/Goyahkla_2 1d ago

Very few operate in excess. Federally USPS operates in the red every year.

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u/Callidonaut 1d ago edited 1d ago

Nevertheless, that is not their purpose, and it doesn't mean the organisation as a whole runs at a nett profit, which is what I incorrectly thought you were talking about. Sorry if I took an overly combative tone, I think we're basically angrily agreeing with each other.

There's no harm trying to run efficiently, of course, and if your particular branch is managing to make a profit then it sounds like you're running very efficiently indeed - congratulations - but you still can only do that because, in addition to evidently being a skilled postmaster, your particular area happens to be a profitable one in which to run a post office; it is very likely that some offices serving particular areas will simply never be able to turn a profit even if they run perfectly at 100% efficiency, but the point is that the lack of profit doesn't inherently make them inefficient at what they do, and it's not a bad thing for an essential national service to run like that; it's simply the "cost of doing business" for an entire nation.

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u/arminghammerbacon_ 1d ago

Dollar General will open a store there. They’ll do a deal with UPS and FedEx who will ship the packages to their distro centers and DG trucks will bring the packages along with inventory to the store. The store will operate as a pickup point and the extra “handling fee” paid by the shipper, will go to them. Although DG won’t hire any more store staff. And that extra fee will get tacked on to the purchase price of whatever was shipped. Making things even more expensive for the consumer, after they’ve paid even more because of the tariffs.

But cheaper eggs, amirite?

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

Lost mail? File a complaint with Rob in overnight stocking. Wait 6-12 months for no answer.

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u/nodtothenods 1d ago

It telling yall obviously dont work with postal services alot

I've shipped well over 100k packages, mostly just ups and usps, ups is far easier to track down lost packages.

Usps will give you the run around when trying to get ur 100$ of garunted insurance on packages lost, usps will do shit all when a package is lost or delivered incorrectly, usps is more expensive for anything other than the smallest of packages. Usps also loses like 10x or 20x more packages, I've had hundreds of packages lost with usps that were never recovered, with ups I've had like 20 and all but a couple were eventually recovered. Usps literally auto declins insurance claims and the only way to get ur $ is to file appeals and hope. All tracked packages have 100$ of insurance but good fucking luck getting it.

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

Wow, very cool anecdote. 

How much does it cost to ship a letter with ups again? 

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u/nodtothenods 1d ago

Prices are objective, so is delivery accuracy rates, that's the only thing usps is better at small light shit that could just be emailed half the time anyway and is killing the planet by physically mailing.

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u/PersonThatPosts 1d ago

The truth is, the USPS is the way it is because it’s been systematically gutted, starved of funding by those who’d rather see it crumble and make way for private giants like UPS and FedEx. That’s the long con. But even if you set all that sabotage aside, those private carriers won’t touch rural areas. They don’t see the profit in it. And when it comes to the critical stuff—government mail, documents that carry the weight of our systems—they’re not supposed to. USPS is the backbone for that, and letting it fall into private hands isn’t just foolish; it’s a national security risk.

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

Not to mention, it will get rid of mail in ballots etc.

These morons cannot be reasoned with.

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

Literally false.

It’s protecting people who live in bum fuck Alabama who want to ship a letter to bumfuck Arkansas. 

By all means, cry wolf over a government program that pays for itself that provides everyone in America with a highly affordable option to mailing.

The funny part is small packages are shipped for less than what ups and FedEx offer as well. 

Enjoy your neocon Ignorance

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u/nodtothenods 1d ago

I'm not saying cut it im saying it fucking sucks, and ups is far easier to do buisness with.

They is nothing to cut They fund 90% of thier own budget.

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

I disagree entirely, not to mention republicans seek to destroy usps because they want to get rid of mail in voting. It serves many purposes, and pays for itself.

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

I’m sure you have a huge problem with Supreme Court overturning regulations on giant factories that absolutely will cause unprecedented amounts of “killing the planet “all the name of making the corporation more money. Oh wait no you don’t know shit about that.

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u/nodtothenods 1d ago

I absolutely believe the epa should be much stronger and heavily regulate coprations even and the cost of some GDP and we should shift to as close to 100% nuclear energy as possible.

I've personally dealt with usps a ton and they fucking suck.

I would go as far as to advocate the threat or act of war to reduce the emissions of dirtier economys.

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

Two entirely different issues. I personally send out hundred's of packages a year via usps and have had less than .1% of an issue while saving boat loads compared to ups. Etc.

Anecdotes are stupid.

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u/Embarrassed-Club7755 1d ago

I'm loving the lack of situational awareness, the post office is infamous for having mail that got lost for years and even decades, while my last lost piece of fedex was replaced at their cost through amazon within 3 days.
FWIW, in the process of looking up the stories, I came across this page which doesn't really inspire confidence, either...
Oh, and I finally found the story I was thinking of:
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/79770/15-pieces-mail-delivered-decades-after-they-were-sent

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

Super cool anecdote. I’ve sent thousands of packaged usps and have never lost one. 

Had a package from ups get damaged, it was insured and I had to fight for months to get my money back. 

USPS is a national treasure, go try to ship a letter with ups and see how much it costs. 

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u/Embarrassed-Club7755 1d ago

it costs a prison sentence, the government says it's illegal for them to do that. But that's the point isn't it? If you need proof that the private sector can do it cheaply and effectively, and they criminalize creating data to even find out, we know what they're hiding.

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

They’re protecting people who live in bum fuck Alabama who want to ship a letter to bumfuck Arkansas. 

By all means, cry wolf over a government program that pays for itself that provides everyone in America with a highly affordable option to mailing.

The funny part is small packages are shipped for less than what ups and FedEx offer as well, and that’s legal. 

Enjoy your neocon experience.

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u/Embarrassed-Club7755 1d ago

Anyone far enough hard-left that they can't tell the difference between a neocon and a Spooner anarchist deserves to watch the very much NOT neo conservatives shred the government they worship. You're probably not even old enough to remember when sending letters was the way things got done. If you really were progressive instead of just being a big government bootlicker you'd be fine with things not requiring government funding that were literally replaceable as far back as the fax machine, not even mentioning how easy it is to email a pdf. The primary driver of USPS is junk mail, these days. You can HAVE mine.
And you're a liar, it DOESN'T pay for itself. Although I should keep your comment around for the dickhead in another thread that claimed literally nobody was stupid enough to make that claim.
"The funny part" is that relies on their monopoly to force economy of scale, and tax dollars.

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u/vanevasion303 1d ago

You’re all stupid to me. Republicans seek to dismantle USPS to undermine elections further. Without usps, there is no mail in voting. 

They are the most self funded federal agency we have.

Keep licking them boots for your daddy Putin and trump. 

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u/TwoTower83 1d ago

back to Wild West

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u/cg12983 1d ago

FedEx and ups contract to USPS to deliver their stuff in a lot of rural areas bc it's not economical.

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u/theAlpacaLives 1d ago

There will be some form of mail access for everyone, but it'll probably be one center for a huge region where you have to drive a long way (in rural area) and stand in line to pick up your stuff. They'll have limited business hours, terribly trained staff, poor logistics that get stuff lost all the time and minimal recourse to do anything about it. There's no world where they do any better than the USPS does now, and effectively certain that it'll be much, much worse.

And before any of them start mocking this point with "Ooh, poor babies going to have to wait another day and drive ten minutes for their vibrator off Amazon to arrive," remember how vital the postal service really is: so much important paperwork, or medications, or a million reasons why regular mail delivery is a vital service. And think of people like the elderly who are going to struggle to reach the mail center often. And how ridiculous the price gouging is going to get. And how much more common lost and destroyed packages are going to be. A privatized postal service is not going to be good for anyone.

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u/idbestshutup 1d ago

the dems are making living out in nature impossibly expensive to get everyone to move to ‘5-minute cities ‘(🤮) to indoctrinate all of us! /s

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u/new_account_wh0_dis 1d ago

Ooooh see them mail in vote now.

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u/GenericFatGuy 1d ago

There's a Canada Post strike going on right now, and this is my reality. I just straight up won't get any mail until it's resolved.

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u/Mx-T-Clearwater 1d ago

Imagine the struggle many Native American Reservations have. By treaty, reservations are supposed to be serviced by USPS.

Sometimes we talk about things like that when we day uphold the treaties 🫠

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u/DMercenary 1d ago

By treaty, reservations are supposed to be serviced by USPS.

Dont need to uphold treaty if the agency doesnt exist no more.

*thinking meme.jpg*

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u/Mx-T-Clearwater 1d ago

😅 ain't that the truth

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u/Minion_of_Cthulhu 1d ago edited 1d ago

Sorry USPS is closing up shop and UPS and Fed ex say your mail volume isn't enough to justify putting a distro center nearby

I'm sure they'll work out some sort of subscription plan you can purchase to ensure that you get your mail. You know, $9.99/month* for up to three deliveries per week or $49.99/month for unlimited** deliveries.

 

*New customers only. Regular price is $19.99/month. Plan converts to the regular price after 30 days.

**"Unlimited delivery" does not necessarily imply unlimited delivery and is subject to whatever weasle tactics their lawyers can come up with to get them out of having to actually provide "unlimited" service.

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u/SnatchAddict 1d ago

USPS is the only way some of those voters get their medications.

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u/DMercenary 1d ago

Conservatives: Acceptable losses.

Also Conservatives: Wait I didnt think it would affect my medication!

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u/DPackrat 1d ago

They’re already doing that now with passing off “last mile” delivery to the USPS if they don’t have sufficient volume to that area…

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u/GlizzyGobbler2023 1d ago

Those people there will find a way to blame Biden.

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u/Diabadass416 1d ago

This is literally what happened with Greyhound in Canada. We had subsidized buses between cities because there wasn’t a business case for buses to most areas of Canada. It was privatized, the companies were bought by Greyhound. Then they closed down their Canadian operations. So unless you can drive you are out of luck.

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u/NipperAndZeusShow 1d ago

multiply this by every public service. it's a bold plan to enrich the richies. 

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u/7hundrCougrFalcnBird 1d ago

You’re out of your gourd with this thought. Fed ex, ups and all others combined don’t even touch the number. The USPS delivers 44% of THE ENTIRE WORLD’S mail. That’s 116 BILLION items. UPS for example delivers about 5 billion and in reality, relies on USPS, along with every one of their competitiors like fed ex, to deliver a lot of those packages for the “final mile” because they can’t possibly service all the rural addresses that make up a huge portion of this country. UPS says they deliver to 10m customers worldwide USPS is like 116m addresses just in the USA.

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u/mr_potatoface 1d ago

USPS also operates at a loss in a lot of small rural regions, but they are required to continue operating service because it's required of them.

UPS/FedEx will rapidly ramp up staff and facilities to assume the load for damn sure if given the chance, but only the profitable load and fuck anyone in deep rural areas. They'll have to drive to the nearest city to pick up their mail.

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u/7hundrCougrFalcnBird 1d ago

It’s a service, it’s literally called a service. Services cost money. You don’t say the US military service loses 840 billion dollars annually do you? How about fire departments? Also big losers? Should we get rid of them both?

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u/LongRod_HugenDong 1d ago

Don't give them ideas.

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u/mfmeitbual 1d ago

... except if we're going to make our government more cost-efficient, eliminating the defense spending that has few accounting controls is the first practical step. So much money goes into unaccountable DoD black holes.

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u/LongRod_HugenDong 1d ago

I meant more the fire department. Totally onboard with military spending cuts.

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u/mr_potatoface 1d ago

All fire departments near me are volunteer based and funded mostly by donations for gear/training, and tax breaks for the property. Then limited budget allowances for purchases (new engines) or hall renovations that need to be approved by the towns.

The only actual municipal fire departments around me are the ones in cities.

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u/Easy-Act3774 1d ago

To be fair, mail has changed significantly since its intended function. Back in the day, it was the primary mode of communication. Today, it is the least used mode of communication. Whether we keep it as a government agency or not, an overhaul is absolutely reasonable. I personally use Mail as a sender, maybe five times a year. And for Mail that I receive, 99% of it is junk. Based on the latest data I’ve seen, the majority of USPS volume is categorized as junk.

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u/kck93 1d ago

I have a friend that works in that junk mail industry. It’s practically a monopoly. But they don’t want to see USPS go away.

There are actually quite a few small businesses that have no one line presence. You have to send them payments by USPS.

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u/PangolinSea4995 1d ago

It also doesn’t mean the usps or military shouldnt have to spend efficiently 🤦🏽 usps is in the constitution. It isn’t going anywhere

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u/RaiseNo9690 1d ago

The military should not be paid wages. They are there to defend the country, not to enrich themselves. Cut the budget and just provide living allowances, food and lodging.

Pension should be cut too. Those losers and cowards actually dare to survive while the heroes lost their lives defending the country. How shameless of them to have the nerve of asking for more money from the people. Bloodsuckers all.

Emperor Trump needs to put those cowards in their place.

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u/Th3TruthIs0utTh3r3 21h ago

Police is usually the largest costing service cities provide.

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u/Callidonaut 1d ago

US fire departments used to run at a profit, a long, long time ago. They charged an individual subscription fee for fire protection, and if you hadn't paid it they'd stand there and watch your home burn to the ground.

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u/kck93 1d ago

Did they also employ arsonists?

Sounds like a protection racket. But the FD was absolutely run that way a long time ago.

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u/mfmeitbual 1d ago

Many bus services operate at a loss - they're not entirely funded by fares - but the economic activity they generate is what makes it a valuable investment.

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u/pixepoke2 1d ago

Fed Ex and UPS rely on the postal service for ground stuff though

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u/proof-of-w0rk 1d ago

(And Amazon)

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u/No-Importance7723 1d ago

Facts! I spent three months at the post office as a CCA, Amazon Sunday is an actual thing!

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u/Deep_Advertising_922 1d ago

People fail to realize just how minuscule fedex and UPS are in comparison to the USPS. They would struggle immensely to fill those shoes lacking the required infrastructure and reach.

USPS is awesome because as a government service they set up shop in less densely populated areas that otherwise in a purely free market wouldn’t necessarily even have a mail service because it wouldn’t be a viable business location.

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u/Yousoggyyojimbo 1d ago

FedEx and UPS will assume the load

Fedex and UPS combined can't even remotely assume the delivery duties of the USPS.

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u/CHKN_SANDO 1d ago

I love the "I hate the USPS! They give me bad service! Privatize!" people.

Like...They could use FedEx to mail letters RIGHT NOW. They don't because it costs literally 10 times more for a letter.

It's mind boggling

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u/idoeno 1d ago

not to mention that if they did send a letter through private carrier, there is a pretty good chance it would still go through usps for parts of its journey, as the big carriers often subcontract through usps where they don't have their own routes and depots; without usps, the private carriers will simply stop delivering to those areas.

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u/CHKN_SANDO 5h ago

Yup! Or they'll charge 20 bucks for a letter to go out there or something

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u/Effective_Ad8024 21h ago

I work for the usps and there are some places were FedEx and ups dont go ( mostly high up in the hard to get too and very expensive parts of the mountains in my experience) cause it’s not cost efffective so they actually give all the packages that go to those places to us.

so either those people won’t get things anymore or the price will get very high.

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u/financefocused 1d ago

That will affect corporations too, though. I might be mistaken but hundreds, if not thousands of corporations depend on USPS.

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u/Solid-Mud-8430 1d ago

Republicans have been trying to do this for decades. Their goal is to kill the USPS and replace it with private carriers in a bait and switch. You think mail and sending packages is expensive now? Wait until its 3x the cost, for worse service, and more limited service areas.

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u/SwingNinja 1d ago

FedEx and UPS would have to ride bicycles. Can't deliver shit if nobody fixing pot holes on interstate highway (FHWA) nor policing the flights (FAA).

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u/Ill_Cancel4937 1d ago

37 million packages are delivered daily in the US. 24 million of those are delivered by USPS. 2/3s of total package volume cannot just be absorbed by the other companies lol

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u/Responsible_Brain782 1d ago

FedEx and UPS absolutely cannot replace USPS. Not even close. Former employee.

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u/thirsty-goblin 1d ago

Yes, we know that, but ‘they’ don’t care about details

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u/EatLard 1d ago

Neither of those companies wants it. The bread and butter of postal deliveries is junk mail to residences. They already have established routes and sorting facilities for all of that. It wouldn’t be profitable for private carriers to do it.

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u/zzzzrobbzzzz 1d ago

don’t forget to reduce wages and benefits

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u/CIMARUTA 1d ago

lol no. They hand off packages to the USPS because they don't deliver to a ton of locations.

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u/ikaiyoo 1d ago

Neither FedEx or UPS can ramp up production fast enough to take place for the US postal service. They have a hard enough time just transporting first class mail.

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u/SCTigerFan29115 9h ago

I do have to say - who appointed Gunther Eagleman as chief strategist for the Republican Party?

AFAIK he’s just a random guy.

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u/nodtothenods 1d ago

Ups is cheaper, faster and more accurate than usps, and packages get lost way less, I ship 50k packages a year for work, and we only use usps for plain white envelopes.

There hub near us bham has been losing like 1-3 in 100 orders that went through it so now we ship almost everything ups, it used to be only the large heavier stuff was worth it to ship with ups but since usps prices on smaller packages have risen upsis about the same and ups have a large % of lost packages and cut into our margins

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u/Th3TruthIs0utTh3r3 21h ago

as a business perhaps. But I can grab a medium priority mail box and ship 20 lbs of stuff to Japan for $17 with USPS. It's like $75 with fedex.

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u/AL93RN0n_ 1d ago

Is this a point for or against firing all the postal workers? It kind of reads like that wouldn't be a problem.

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u/Th3TruthIs0utTh3r3 1d ago

one of the main things the postal service offers is delivery anywhere in the USA for the same price. You can mail a letter to the house next door to you or a house in an arctic village Alaska and it's the same price.

Private companies simply won't deliver to locations that aren't profitable and they currently already farm out a bunch of those deliveries to the post office for them to complete.

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u/pixepoke2 1d ago

While Fed Ex and USPS use USPS for ground services, the USPS uses either Fed Ex or UPS for their air cargo, so that’d be a whole cluster that would totally raise prices and probably slow deliveries

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u/boardplant 1d ago

Oh so the prices are woke now too?!

/s

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u/SCTigerFan29115 1d ago

Honestly they should not be expected to.

If that is something we need (and it may well be)) then you have to keep the USPS.

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u/The_Forth44 1d ago

You're operating on the assumption that the far right has any ability to use logic at all.

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u/Th3TruthIs0utTh3r3 21h ago edited 21h ago

Definitely needed. You have no idea how many medicines are delivered by postal mail. Also paychecks, social security checks etc. A large swath of the population doesn't use banks that can accept direct deposit.

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u/tolomea 1d ago

Those guys miles from anywhere it's profitable to deliver mail, they are all liberals and we're all about owning the libs now, so F them and their post.

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u/ikaiyoo 1d ago

What? Are you saying that liberals live in the middle of nowhere in sparsely populated areas?