Going Postal: Saturday mail delivery in Canada was eliminated by Canada Post on February 1, 1969

The United States Postal Service has long lived on the financial edge, as a quasi government agency supposedly managing itself as if it were a private enterprise but it has never been as close to the financial precipice as it is today: the agency is so low on cash that it will not be able to make a $5.5 billion heakthcare premium due September 30  may have to shut down entirely this winter unless Congress takes emergency action to stabilize its finances. USPS already owes taxpayers $12 billion.

That didn’t stop the Postal Worker’s union from fielding a national ad campaign saying USPS uses no taxpayer dollars relying entirely on sale of stamps and postage and that is simply not factual.

“Our situation is extremely serious,” the postmaster general, Patrick R. Donahoe, said in an interview. “If Congress doesn’t act, we will default.”

In recent weeks, Mr. Donahoe has been pushing a series of painful cost-cutting measures to erase the agency’s deficit, which will reach $9.2 billion this fiscal year. They include eliminating Saturday mail delivery, closing up to 3,700 postal locations and laying off 120,000 workers of its 574,000 employees- nearly one-fifth of the agency’s work force - despite a no-layoffs clause in the unions’ contracts.

Decades of contractual promises made to unionized workers, including no-layoff clauses, are increasing the post office’s costs. Labor represents 80 percent of the agency’s expenses, compared with 53 percent at United Parcel Service and 32 percent at FedEx, its two biggest private competitors. Postal workers also receive more generous health benefits than most other federal employees.

Few will remember when USPS sued to stop UPS saying only it could deliver packages. They lost in the courts. Even as the post office is begging for a bailout it continues to advertise including title sponsorship on Good Morning America’s weather segments.