[img]583|left|Eric L. Wattree||no_popup[/img]The U.S. Postal Service is on the verge of collapse. Customer service is being curtailed, the price of stamps is going up, much- needed employees are being excessed, and the wages of gainfully employed workers are being stolen with impunity.
Yet it has been widely reported that former Postmaster Gen. John E. Potter walked out the door this month with the greater part of $6 million in bonuses and perks in his retirement package. Something is terribly wrong with the picture.
It is yet another example of how those in power are being enriched at the expense of poor and middle-class Americans. It also is another step by the United States of America towards becoming a banana republic.
The forty-year experiment of trying to run the Postal Service like a private business has been a total failure. The Postal Service should stand as a poster child to the fact that when you try to provide a public service using the methods of private enterprise, the greed attendant to the profit motive will invariably overwhelm the incentive to provide the service.
The intent of this series is not to further denigrate the Postal Service. It is doing a far better job of than I could.
Since we want to be productive, we will discuss steps that must be taken to turn the agency around. That would take a book. Instead, we will lay an outline, then address each issue in a separate article.
The Worst Problem
The first issue is executive bonuses, primary source of the agency's problems. Executive bureaucrats in government agencies already are being paid to do their jobs. They should address their responsibilities and appreciate that they have a job. Most are overpaid in their base salaries, and they're not even earning that.
Anyone who disagrees should ask one question: What did Gen. Potter do for the Postal Service to warrant $5.5 million?
The law should prohibit public executives being paid, or accepting, anything beyond their base salary.
Creating a mindset where public bureaucrats expect to be compensated beyond their base can become a slippery slope. It could lead to wholesale corruption of government agencies, as found in many countries and now in the Postal Service. That is why the practice should be forbidden.
Employee morale is a related issue. Executives should recognize that an organization's most valuable asset is its employees. Most Postal executives make the mistake of thinking that they are the Postal Service.
When Your Followers Turn on You
The Postal Service is made up of its nearly 600,000 employees. If you antagonize them, you no longer have an organization, just unhappy people whose primary mission in life is to undermine their bosses. Such workers give no more than is necessary to maintain their jobs.
Under those conditions, the Postal Service cannot survive. It needs every employee to contribute all of his/her experience, knowledge, and expertise to make the Postal Service more efficient. The agency needs employees who are willing to say, “I know this is not my responsibility, but I see something here that can cost the Postal Service money. I am going to take a minute of my time to correct it.”
Most employees are no longer doing that. The Postal Service treats employees so badly that kind of incentive has been lost. They may correct a situation that will inconvenience the public, when it comes to something that may benefit their superior, but they hope for the worst.
Creativity is suffering from the self-serving attitude of Postal managers, executive managers. I hear from an increasing number of irate station managers as well. In the past, some of the most innovative employees would compete for positions in management. They were more interested in personal accomplishment and the challenge of resolving problems than signs on their door.
In the current environment, those vying for management jobs don't want to work and are willing cheat, steal and harass their fellow employees. Lack of character is part of the job description.
The Postal Service is run by the worst employees, harassing and dictating to the best.
The tail wags the dog. Many in management realize this. They didn't get respect as employees because colleagues regarded them as lazy. They would not have survived as craft employees. Consistent with their lack of character and immaturity, they ignore the Postal Service's mission. They give priority to their personal game of payback.
These dysfunctions are a direct result of the greed attendant to attaching a profit motive to public service. In the next few weeks, we intend to connect dots, one issue at a time, because we're looking for a change we can believe in.
Eric L. Wattree is a writer, poet, and musician, born in Los Angeles. A columnist for The Los Angeles Sentinel, The Black Star News, a staff writer for Veterans Today, he is a contributing writer to Your Black World, the Huffington Post, ePluribus Media and other online sites and publications. He also is the author of “A Message From the Hood.”
Mr. Wattree may be contacted at wattree.blogspot.com or Ewattree@Gmail.com
Religious bigotry: It’s not that I hate everyone who doesn’t look, think, and act like me – it’s just that God does
