{"id":14678,"date":"2016-04-16T08:29:35","date_gmt":"2016-04-16T13:29:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/?p=14678"},"modified":"2016-04-16T08:29:35","modified_gmt":"2016-04-16T13:29:35","slug":"apwu-president-mark-dimondstein-2-cent-postage-cut-is-bad-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/2016\/04\/16\/apwu-president-mark-dimondstein-2-cent-postage-cut-is-bad-news\/","title":{"rendered":"APWU President Mark Dimondstein: 2-Cent Postage Cut is \u2018Bad News\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"news-date-inline\"><span class=\"date-display-single\">APWU &#8211; 04\/14\/2016<\/span><span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span>&#8211;<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/span>A ruling by the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) that required the Postal Service to lower postage rates from 49 to 47 cents will \u201cdisrupt service and undermine a great national treasure,\u201d said APWU President Mark Dimondstein. \u201cThe decision is bad news for customers, workers and the Postal Service,\u201d he said.<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-7390\" src=\"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/APWU-Pres-Dimondstein.gif\" alt=\"APWU-Pres-Dimondstein\" width=\"292\" height=\"170\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The price reduction, the first since 1919, ended the emergency increase granted in the wake of the Great Recession. It is expected to cost the Postal Service $2 billion in revenue annually.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe want our customers to enjoy the lowest postage rates possible, but postage can\u2019t be so low that it destroys service and damages the institution,\u201d Dimondstein said. \u201cOur country needs a vibrant Postal Service and the USPS needs revenue to properly serve the people.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe PRC decision fits right in with the \u20184 Ds\u2019 strategy of the privatizers: Defund the USPS; degrade service; demonize the workers, and dismantle the institution,\u201d he said. \u201cThe ruling \u2013 along with the congressional mandate that requires management to pre-fund retiree healthcare costs 75 years into the future \u2013 defunds the USPS.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe 2-cent reduction is a boon to the major mailers who already get excessive discounts at the expense of individual mailers. It won\u2019t save individual mailers much money at all.<\/p>\n<p class=\"last\">\u201cBut it will further damage service and undermine a great national treasure. Two of the three PRC members\u00a0\u2013 one Republican and one Democrat \u2013 shamefully voted\u00a0for the 2-cent reduction.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>APWU &#8211; 04\/14\/2016\u00a0&#8211;\u00a0A ruling by the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) that required the Postal Service to lower postage rates from 49 to 47 cents will \u201cdisrupt service and undermine a great national treasure,\u201d said APWU President Mark Dimondstein. \u201cThe decision is bad news for customers, workers and the Postal Service,\u201d he said. The price reduction, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7390,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14678","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-apwu-news","last_archivepost"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14678","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14678"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14678\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14679,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14678\/revisions\/14679"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14678"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14678"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/postalemployeenetwork.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14678"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}