Postal workers in Wisconsin are optimistic that a new law overhauling the U.S. Postal Service and injecting more than $100 billion into the service will help put an end to years of instability in the service.
Highlights
- Postal Service Reform Act will save money by reducing USPS’s health care costs and eliminating a burdensome federal requirement that the service pre-fund retirees’ expenses.
- The bill also makes six-day delivery a matter of law, after some cost-cutting plans could have ended Saturday service.
- It comes after the federal agency last year announced slower service and higher costs for postage stamps.
- Wisconsin lawmakers expressed concern about the effects of mail slowdowns on rural residents who rely on mail service to deliver their prescription medications.
- The postal service’s total mail volume has fallen in the last decade, but the volume of packages shipped has steadily increased, according to federal data.