Great question. And for Union members who are seeing their paychecks decline (due to loss of OT) and for those that mostly see things thru a partisan lens, there is one and only one reason. Perhaps Occam’s Razor applies; perhaps not.
But I can easily postulate several reasons why equipment might be moved. For example,
https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/13/politics/postal-service-sorting-machines/index.html
Thanks for this - I have several family members in PA, I just sent this to them along with althernatives. 
You can request a mail in ballot now in PA. You don’t have to wait till October. You can also drop off your completed ballot at a drop box, you don’t have to rely on the mail. PA is also paying for first class postage for ballot returns to help alleviate the issue New York faced.
The key is to not wait till the last minute to request the ballot. Mail in voting is new in PA. We used to only have absentee ballots.
It worked fine in the primary. I received an email confirming my ballot request. One confirming it was sent to me and then one when voter services received it from me.
We live in Michigan, which was specifically named by USPS as a state for which they are unable to guarantee ballots will arrive on time. We can drop completed ballots in a mailbox-like Drop off at the township, so H & I did that for the August primary.
But D (a different township than we are in) didn’t get her ballot for the August election until 5 pm the day of voting. She & her H went in person that morning, and they said that there were a number of people there who also had not received their ballots. The November election is going to be a mess, if something doesn’t happen to help the mail system. Having to process all the no-ballot-received folks will surely be s-l-o-w.
It would seem that putting more money and resources into the Postal system now to be ready for November would make a lot of sense. Cutting back in the midst of a pandemic seems counter-productive to a smooth and accurate election, not to mention all the other present uses of the USPS which are being impacted by the refusal to fund adequately.
The news channels had a lot of the state election officials on today from different states. Most of them said they are dealing with the post office and it shouldn’t change their ballots being mailed or returned, but that they are aware of the tight time frames for voting. I do not think it will effect the presidential election but it may require people to decide on the other races (governor, senator, house members) or ballot issues much earlier than they would have in states where they have to vote early.
We, of course, will have to put up with the media blitz for issues and races right up to Nov 5. I am so sick of them already!
Yes, it is counterproductive to a smooth and accurate election, so one does wonder why the powers that be would do something counterproductive to a smooth and accurate election.
No need to wonder, it’s been stated explicitly.
Postal Service has warned FORTY SIX states that their ballots may not get delivered in time. UNACCEPTABLE!!!
The election is on **November 3/b
My neighbor’s brother works for the post office. He said the new post master has made things incredibly difficult. It was tough before, but he says it’s impossible now.
I haven’t read the whole thread, but yesterday at work, we received a ton of mail that had been postmarked in March and early April! Who knows where it had been “lost” for 4.5 months.
I wouldn’t put a $100 bill in the mail much less my ballot. And that’s been my opinion for years. Who would put the only copy of an important document in the mail?
I read an article yesterday explaining the post office budget and the new head. In the original CARES act, the Post office asked for 10 billion in help but instead got a loan, so more debt on the budget. They had 10,000 employees out with covid or symptoms. They were already short of employees. That meant more overtime or a lack of service.
The new head came in (June) with a big deficit. He is a logistics expert and was hired to make things more efficient and balance the budget. He’s doing things any business would to balance the budget like cut overtime, cut lobby hours, and change pick up routes. The union isn’t happy because they like that overtime pay. At another business you could choose to take your $$ elsewhere if you didn’t like the service, but there is only one postal service. You could use FedEx to send a letter, but it would cost you $10 instead of $0.55
Now whether it SHOULD reform like this is a different question. Maybe it should be considered a government service like road repair or schools and funded that way, but so far it hasn’t been. The post office currently gets $0 in the budget, and now wants $25B. They are used to their big surge in mail being at Christmas, not for the election. They aren’t staffed for that, and they aren’t seeing an increase in revenue for the bulk metered ballot mailed out and the returns that may be metered or stamped.
Post office can’t just raise their costs to meet new labor costs. I was at the post office the other day and there were 3 windows open. At #1, a woman seemed to be sending all her possessions to Mars. She had about 5 large boxes (all with FedEx on them), was filling out customs forms, was speaking a foreign language with another woman and on the phone, kept walking away from the window and then walking back after talking on the phone. At #2, same story but different language and not as loud. Her clerk was new (I had him as a trainee last week) so he had questions. At #3, business as usual and she took care of the line while the other two dealt with the shipments to Mars. I don’t think there was any profit being made that day on windows 1 and 2.
The Postmaster General holds a 30M equity stake in his previous company, which is a USPS contractor. What happens when you cut overtime and remove sorting machines to make it more difficult for USPS employees to sort and deliver mail? You send more work to contractors to make up for the gap.
What happens when a contracting company announces enlarged contracts and revenue from the USPS? Their stock goes up. Would it be pure, unforeseen, happy coincidence that you just happen to own 30M worth of equity in one of those contracting companies which profited as a direct result of your decisions?
Now all the changes might be 100% legit and warranted. But with the appearance of unethical self-serving behavior actions are going to be viewed through that lens. The Postmaster General can very easily prove that he’s not self-dealing by selling off his stake in his previous company (and his Amazon options). We’ll get the Inspector General’s opinion eventually as they’ve opened an investigation.
It is not appropriate for USPS to introduce efficiencies that conflict with the needs and expectations which many of us view as its traditional purpose. It is not a profit making corporation that decides its mission unilaterally. The many interacting issues need to be addressed by an apolitical consensus on what is in the national interest.
It may not be a profit making corporation but if it’s consumer funded rather than Congressionally funded, efficiencies should be introduced that aim for, at a minimum breaking even ( and a little profit cushion never hurts any business), not running huge deficits.
I feel pretty confident in saying that the creation of the post office and it’s purpose wasn’t and still isn’t to effectuate mail in voting.
Postal Service operates as its own entity separate from the federal government, yet has to have every postal increase approved by Congress. It is between a rock and hard place. 55 cents to mail a letter is a BARGAIN. Let’s say they were allowed to raise the cost to $1 per letter–still a bargain, IMHO, but closer to what it actually costs to deliver the letter.
$1 per letter would only mean fewer bills paid by mail, many fewer letters. (Who sends letters anymore?) Except for birthday and other special occasion cards, I never send any. Birthday cards with their distinctive shape and colored envelopes are frequently stolen; the thieves (who may be postal workers) know that there may be cash included.
Email and texts are ‘free’. Bills can almost always be paid online. The postal service is really between the rock and the hard place. Raise rates and go further out of business.
They also fund their own pensions and this is the problem. No one sees what is obviously happening. Slowing the mail feeds to not getting ballots in time. My sister who is a postal worker said her sorting machine was taken for no reason. They barely get enough mail to deliver lately… No one sees a problem with this? The workers are livid and look out for a national strike