Trump attacking Amazon

[Sherrerd]

@Chronos

Don’t forget, either, that a lot of those pensions are subsidizing the Department of War. All federal pensions use the same system, and your pension is based on how many years you’ve worked in the federal government. And the Post Office is also required to give preferential hiring to veterans. So if someone serves in the military for a few years, and then goes to work for the USPS, the USPS has to pay not only their share of that person’s retirement, but also the military’s.

Good point–the USPS does employ thousands of veterans.

[Fear_Itself]

Trump campaign spent $150,000 on Amazon

A report by CBS News digging into Federal Election Commission records found that in 2015 and 2016 the campaign spent $158,498.41 in 379 transactions classified as office supply purchases. The committee continued after the election to spend money on the website, purchasing more than $2000 in 2017.

CBS was unable determine if the Trump campaign was an Amazon Prime member eligible for free two day delivery.

[Tom_Tildrum]

@Chronos

Don’t forget, either, that a lot of those pensions are subsidizing the Department of War. All federal pensions use the same system, and your pension is based on how many years you’ve worked in the federal government. And the Post Office is also required to give preferential hiring to veterans. So if someone serves in the military for a few years, and then goes to work for the USPS, the USPS has to pay not only their share of that person’s retirement, but also the military’s.

No, there isn’t any subsidy involved. A veteran or military retiree wanting credit for his or her service years toward civilian federal retirement must pay a lump-sum deposit (called a service credit deposit) to the agency to cover its increased costs.

[jayjay]

Congress requires the USPS to fund pensions and healthcare benefits for 75 years ahead of the present date. They’re paying into retirement for employees who aren’t even born yet.

[elucidator]

Why the fuck should Himself worry about some river in Africa?

[Little_Nemo]

@jayjay

Congress requires the USPS to fund pensions and healthcare benefits for 75 years ahead of the present date. They’re paying into retirement for employees who aren’t even born yet.

And when those future employees do retire, they may not get their pensions anyway. Congress required the Post Office to build up a huge reservoir of money to fund future pensions - and then Congress raided the fund. Like the Social Security fund, a lot of the assets in the fund are just IOU’s.

[foolsguinea]

@Tamerlane

It should be said that Bezos’ isn’t a choir boy - he’s reputedly a bit of a narcissist himself and his labor policies in particular have come under quite of bit of criticism. While probably most anyone south of Pol Pot looks good compared to Trump, objectively speaking Jeff Bezos isn’t exactly Prince Charming.

I would guess that even with the Trump Organization’s anti-union activities, Trump treats his employees better on average than Bezos does. Picking this fight makes Trump look good politically. Other big businesses hate Bezos, and labor has no reason to love him.

[Smapti]

@Little_Nemo

True. But there are tens of millions of people who are better than Trump. What’s got him annoyed with Bezos specifically?

Bezos is richer than him and owns a newspaper that doesn’t faun over him.

[Robot_Arm]

@foolsguinea

I would guess that even with the Trump Organization’s anti-union activities, Trump treats his employees better on average than Bezos does. Picking this fight makes Trump look good politically. Other big businesses hate Bezos, and labor has no reason to love him.

How many employees does Trump have, or did he have before divesting himself to become president? There are lots of buildings with his name on them, but as I understand it he just licenses his name and collects a fee for it. It doesn’t take many Trump employees to do that.

Of all the differences between Trump and Bezos, no one has mentioned that Bezos actually does something. Love them or hate them, Amazon does provide a service to customers. They take orders and ship products, and do it well enough to have built an empire and expanded into things like e-books, Alexa, even groceries. When people used to talk about having a business leader as President, I always thought that’s what they wanted; someone who could effectively manage a large organization to accomplish a task. Trump is a name, a brand; but that’s the beauty of it, he doesn’t do anything.

[Johnny_Bravo]

@Robot_Arm

How many employees does Trump have, or did he have before divesting himself to become president?

We’re talking about the ones who actually get paid, right?

Anyway, Wikipedia says about 22,000. Amazon is over a half-million.

[ThelmaLou]

The fact that amazon started by selling books and still does sell a ginormous boatload of them would be enough to trip thump’s hot wire. *BOOKS?? We don’t need no stinkin’ books! Anything I need to know can be boiled down to one large-type paragraph. Anything more is just filler. *

[Chronos]

Yeah, Amazon might have contracts that its employees work for really low wages and otherwise poor conditions, but they at least honor those contracts. An honored contract for low wages is a lot better than a contract for good wages that never get paid, and the employer sues you when you try to get them.

[BeenJammin]

I suspect the Amazon topic circulating withing WH corridors and meetings is just a red herring, at it’s base. Everyone knows USPS financials have been miserable since day 1. Some USPS friendly (lobbyist, senior bureaucrat, whoever) managed to somehow get the idea that this could be blamed on Amazon planted in Herr Douchey’s mind. Probably not hard to get him started on it with Bezos and the Washpost details mixed into the dialog.

[Bijou_Drains]

Bezos also has a rocket company similar to SpaceX. They have only done sub orbital flights so far, it’s Blue Origin

Blue Origin - Wikipedia

[Mr.Miskatonic]

@Sherrerd

If they were allowed to treat pension obligations the same way virtually all other government or quasi-governmental institutions do—that is, not to fully fund them but instead to demonstrate mathematically that ‘the money will [probably] be there when it’s needed’—if they were allowed to do that, they’d be in the black. And quite profitably, too.

In addition to being required to pre-fund pensions, the USPS is required to pre-fund health care payments to retirees–another requirement other bodies don’t face:

U.S. Postal Service marks 11 straight years of financial loss | PBS NewsHour

Letting them have some flexibility in negotiating packages for retailers would also help. Right now the pricing levels are limited to bulk, online, and at the post office. Not much room to compete with UPS & FEDEX.

[Bijou_Drains]

FedEx actually moves a lot of USPS packages. They start out with FedEx and then the PO delivers them once they get to your local Post office.

[Jonathan_Chance]

@Chronos

Yeah, I’ve never understood the Republican desire to destroy the Post Office.

Don’t overcomplicate things, people.

The USPS workers have a fairly strong union. They have a Political Action Committee - APWU PAC - that spends more than $1,000,000 per election cycle on political donations and activities. 82% of that spending in the last cycle went toward Democratic Party candidates and issues.

There doesn’t need to be more of an argument than that. However it may have started out - possibly basic anti-union activities - the Republican Party and the APWU PAC are now blood enemies.

[Exapno_Mapcase]

@Bijou_Drains

FedEx actually moves a lot of USPS packages. They start out with FedEx and then the PO delivers them once they get to your local Post office.

This is expressed backwards. The USPS does final delivery of some FedEx packages because the USPS is required to service every address. FedEx pays a fee for this service. Properly, they are always FedEx packages and queries and complaints should be sent to FedEx.

The fact that FedEx would find it wildly too expensive to do what the USPS has done since the beginning of time, with lower prices, says everything about what getting rid of the USPS and privatizing mail would mean.

[BeenJammin]

@Exapno_Mapcase

The fact that FedEx would find it wildly too expensive to do what the USPS has done since the beginning of time, with lower prices, …

I’m pretty sure anyone with even a smidgen of fiduciary responsibility in them would not be doing anything remotely resembling to what USPS has been doing. :smack:

[running_coach]

@BeenJammin

I’m pretty sure anyone with even a smidgen of fiduciary responsibility in them would not be doing anything remotely resembling to what USPS has been doing. :smack:

You do realize the USPS is required, by law, to deliver to all addresses regardless of cost or efficiency.

Most people probably don’t know what a universal service obligation is, much less that the Postal Service is bound by one. But a USO, as it’s commonly called, is essential to ensuring that everyone receives the mail service they need. And the Postal Service’s USO is long overdue for updating and clarification, as you can see in our new white paper, Guiding Principles for a New Universal Service Obligation.

In general, a USO is a collection of requirements that ensure everyone in the country receives a minimum level of mail service at a reasonable price. The Postal Service’s USO includes a requirement to provide mail services to everyone, regardless of where they live, and for at least one mail product, at a uniform price. Other features of the USO are understood to include frequency of delivery, a range of product offerings, access to mail services, and quality of service. For instance, delivering your mail 6 days a week is part of the USO.