First-class stamps to cost 49 cents as of Jan. 26

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP-Excite

By BRADLEY KLAPPER

WASHINGTON (AP) - Mailing a letter is about to get a little more expensive.

Regulators on Tuesday approved a temporary price hike of 3 cents for a first-class stamp, bringing the charge to 49 cents a letter in an effort to help the Postal Service recover from severe mail decreases brought on by the 2008 economic downturn.

Many consumers won't feel the price increase immediately. Forever stamps, good for first-class postage whatever the future rate, can be purchased at the lower price until the new rate is effective Jan. 26.

The higher rate will last no more than two years, allowing the Postal Service to recoup $2.8 billion in losses. By a 2-1 vote, the independent Postal Regulatory Commission rejected a request to make the price hike permanent, though inflation over the next 24 months may make it so.

FULL story at link.


Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20131224/DAAT0R0G0.html

[Politicalboi]

1. Make it a buck if it keeps the USPS open

A lot of people don't use stamps anymore. And the ones that do, or the times you need to, a buck really isn't that bad for a hand delivered piece of mail. For the poorer people, they could give them stamps cheaper when they use their EBT card to buy them.

[freshwest]

7. I agree, if that's what it takes. You can't send it cheaper anywhere, any other way. I've had to

send things in area where no postal service was available and the rates I was charged were abusive by the private carriers.

The USPS is the closest to a socialized government service most people can use whenever they want. Some things are just cheaper that way.

I see little decrease where I live, even though many people are paying bills online or with direct deductions from their bank accounts. I always instruct that any delivery be made by them if at all possible.

Love 'em.

[Earth_First]

2. Round it off...

0.50 is still a bargain!

[davidpdx]

10. I don't understand why they just didn't do that

It might hold off a rate increase another year and having to go through the process of asking for one. Those Forever stamps are looking better and better. Now we know what they mean by Forever.

[House of Roberts]

3. Raise the bulk rate that pays for all the junk mail.

That's where the real money is. I get way too much glossy, high quality advertising in my mailbox, so it must be too cheap for the corporations.

[SoapBox]

4. Raise the rates on all that political mail!

Raise it to the MOON!

[Downwinder]

5. More argument for increasing minimum wage.

[RC]

6. Stop the front loading of the Retirement fund and do it the correct way, like everyone else.

That is the real problem with the USPS.

[Prophet 451]

12. Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner!

You got it in one. As one of the few genuinely socialised services (and the only one directly ordered by the Constitution), conservatives have been trying to kill off USPS for years and the insane pension situation is their key to doing so.

Now, that's not to say that the USPS couldn't do with a little updating. Post offices here (the UK) also provide basic banking services, fishing licenses, car tax, passport applications. All the times you have to deal with officialdom can be done through the Post Office. Left up to me, I'd modernise your post office along similar lines, put the price for first class stamps up to 50 cents (which it will probably go to in a few years anyway) and raise the price of bulk mailing to fund the modernisation.

[anasv]

13. +1

I believe also that I read somewhere that in time-adjusted real money, a stamp price has not gone up in decades.

[gvstn]

14. Exactly.

All the kill the USPS types talking about privatization being more efficient are ridiculous. When was the last time you went to UPS or FedEx and they charged you 50 cents to mail something from Coast to Coast? It hasn't and will never happen. If the post office closed tomorrow then postage would go up to $1.50 minimum and even then only be delivered in urban areas. USPS works and it works for everyone.

[jwirr]

8. And no one will ever convince me that this is not a bargain. I am thankful for the US postal service

[Populist_Prole]

11. Same here. It's a solid underpinning of infrastructure so many take for granted

Even the right wing nutjobs that love to bash it depend on it.

[tofuandbeer]

9. Oh! The agony! :/ (sarcasm)

Rock on USPS!

[KareBear]

15. Honestly... I never use USPS

I haven't mailed anything in years. We haven't had a book of stamps in the house in at least 3 years since they just sat around forever and were useless once the rate raised (you had to get helper stamps). We get 95% junk mail. The mail I do get that is important I also get email alerts for like bills.

When we DO get mail, the post person sometimes just tosses it up on our front porch without putting it in the mail slot. Rain or shine. Other times they will get it in the slot but will smash it in so that it is so crinkled it is unusable. FedEx and UPS will hide our packages when they are delivered so they aren't visible, but the USPS just sits the box right in plain view on the porch.

If I could I'd tape shut the mail slot and put up a sign that says US Mail is not accepted at this address. They'd probably just dump the mail on the front porch as usual.