U.S. POSTAL SERVICE RECEIVES MAY ‘PORKER OF THE MONTH’ AWARD | Citizens Against Government Waste

U.S. POSTAL SERVICE RECEIVES MAY ‘PORKER OF THE MONTH’ AWARD

Press Release



For Immediate ReleaseContact: Jim Campi
May 11, 2000(202) 467-5300

 


 


(Washington, D.C.) – Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), America’s largest taxpayer watchdog group, today named the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) as its May “Porker of the Month.”  Recently, two senior Postal Service officials got a plum perk: the Post Office paid a total of $250,000 in moving expenses for the pair even though they didn’t change job sites.  One employee bought a home just ten miles away, the other thirty miles away.  One of these pampered executives was USPS’s Chief Financial Officer, who announced his retirement shortly after news of the moving expenses became public.


“Such small abuses flourish in agencies with little oversight or competition,” said CAGW President Thomas Schatz.  “Given the Postal Service’s captive customer pool, there is little incentive to increase efficiency.  USPS is a bureaucracy, characterized by all the waste, patronage, mismanagement and absence of accountability present in traditional bureaucracies.”


USPS likes to portray itself as a private-sector business, but it’s actually a heavily subsidized quasi-government agency.  It is exempt from paying state and local taxes, borrows money at discounted interest rates, has the right of eminent domain, and the full faith and backing of the U.S. government.  These benefits are valued at more than $1 billion annually.


Further, its monopoly control over letters means a captive rate base that generates about $45 billion a year.  By law, it doesn’t even have to be profitable.  USPS is only required to break even – yet it has raked in profits of $5.5 billion over the last five years and implemented a billion dollar rate increase just over a year ago.


“USPS likes to have it both ways, public and private.  Apparently, some of their senior management likes to have it both ways too — get the moving expense without changing offices.  That’s why CAGW is happy to deliver the May Porker of the Month Award to the U.S. Postal Service,” Schatz concluded.


CAGW’s “Porker of the Month” award is a dubious honor, given to lawmakers and government officials who have shown a blatant disregard for the interests of taxpayers.  Recipients of the award are listed on an online “Hall of Shame,” located at CAGW’s website, www.cagw.org.  Past recipients of the award include First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton (D) and Senate Appropriations Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska).


For more information, see CAGW’s web site at www.cagw.org.  CAGW is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government.


 


 

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