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POSTAL SERVICE REFORM ACT OF 2022--Motion to Proceed--Continued
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan.
H.R. 3076
Mr. PETERS. Madam President, last night, the Senate came together for the American people and overwhelmingly voted to move forward on historic, bipartisan, bicameral, and long-overdue reforms that will help ensure the stability and the long-term success of the U.S. Postal Service.
The Postal Service is one of our Nation's oldest and most trusted institutions. It serves as a critical lifeline for millions of Americans, including seniors and veterans in rural communities who expect the Postal Service to deliver vital mail, including supplies and medications.
However, for more than 15 years, this public service and its dedicated workers have been hindered by burdensome financial requirements. The need to quickly pass these balanced reforms, which are broadly supported by the American people, has become increasingly urgent.
One persistent burden has been a requirement to prefund every single cent of healthcare benefits that every single postal worker employee will use when they eventually retire, no matter how far off that may be. This is something that no business in America is required to do, and for good reason. It makes no practical sense, and it has imposed an enormous cost on the Postal Service that has threatened their ability to provide reliable and timely delivery.
In recent years, we have seen firsthand how burdensome policies have driven the Postal Service to resort to harsh measures to cut costs and, as a result, compromise delivery service. We must act now to set this critical institution on a sustainable financial footing by passing the Postal Service Reform Act.
This bipartisan, commonsense legislation will save the Postal Service more than $49 billion in the next 10 years by eliminating the aggressive prefunding requirement for retiree health benefits and by integrating postal retirees' healthcare with Medicare.
These changes will help ensure the Postal Service, which is self-
sustaining and does not receive taxpayer funding, can continue serving the people and avoid making severe cuts down the line that would impact millions of Americans. These reforms will also require the Postal Service to deliver 6 days a week so it can continue serving as a critical lifeline for countless communities that need timely delivery of their essential needs.
This legislation will also make the Postal Service more transparent and accountable to the American people by making weekly local performance data publicly available online, enabling every single community to see exactly how the Postal Service is performing in their area.
I introduced this legislation in the Senate last year and have worked hand in hand with Ranking Member Rob Portman from Ohio, as well as Chairwoman Maloney and Ranking Member Comer on the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, to craft this bill.
Last month, the House passed this legislation with overwhelming bipartisan support. Last night, we saw this body advance it with significant bipartisan support once again. Now the Senate has a historic opportunity to move this legislation forward.
I am proud to have helped secure significant bipartisan support for our Senate companion bill, with a total of 14 Democratic and 14 Republican cosponsors backing the legislation.
Together, we can finally, after more than 15 years, pass this commonsense, bipartisan legislation to set the Postal Service on a stable financial foot and bring it into the future. We can support our dedicated and hard-working postal employees, as well as the customers whom they serve. We can set the Postal Service up for success so that families and small businesses, veterans, seniors, and all Americans can continue to rely on this critical public service, as they have for generations. We can show the American people this body can set aside partisanship and work hand in hand to improve their lives.
Every single day that we delay will just hurt the Postal Service. We must pass these urgently needed reforms. I urge all of my colleagues to support this legislation and pass it swiftly so that we can ensure the long-term success of this treasured institution and the essential role it plays in the lives of every single American.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.
Mr. PORTMAN. Madam President, I rise today in support of the legislation that my colleague from Michigan just talked about. This is H.R. 3076, the Postal Service Reform Act. What it really is, though, is ensuring that the post office works, that it works for the constituents whom I represent and people all around the country.
Unfortunately, right now, the post office is in trouble. It is in dire need of reform, and if we don't do it, we are going to have big problems. The post office just had its 15th consecutive annual net loss in 2021, and they projected they are going to be insolvent in the next few years unless we make these reforms and other reforms as well that can be made by the post office itself. In fact, they project a 10-year loss of $160 billion if we just continue with the status quo.
The reality is that the Postal Service is delivering less and less first-class mail. We are all online. We are not sending as many letters as we used to. Yet there are more and more addresses that they deliver to because more and more people want to get the mail they do deliver, the packages, the direct mail, and so on. So it doesn't work. It is a recipe for ruin if we don't adjust to the new reality and make some necessary changes.
Last year, Senator Peters and I did introduce the legislation he talked about. We had 26 cosponsors, equally divided between Republicans and Democrats. We kept this bipartisan from the start. In fact, I would even say we tried to keep it nonpartisan. What could be more nonpartisan than trying to save the post office? Everybody cares about the post office and wants to be sure it is working well and working efficiently. It is not a partisan issue; it is of importance to all Americans--young, old, urban, rural, everybody.
I hear a lot about it back home from my constituents. A constituent from Butler County, OH, wrote me recently and said:
My father, a veteran of the Vietnam war, has COPD and is 70 years old. He receives his lifesaving medication through the mail. My father can't breathe without his daily inhaler.
We have to be sure the post office works for him.
A constituent from Montgomery County wrote:
As a disabled veteran, I need to vote by mail.
We have the ability to vote by mail in Ohio. It is no-fault absentee. But it requires the Postal Service to work, right? It doesn't work well if the ballot is late and is not counted.
A constituent from Richland County, OH, wrote:
The post office is essential to millions of Americans, including seniors and veterans who depend on it for medications, small business owners who are already struggling.
Everybody. Everybody.
Putting the Postal Service on sound financial footing cannot be accomplished through an act of Congress alone. This is not just about passing a law here. We are going to do that. We had a good vote last night, and I think we will get more people supporting it, I hope, as we go through the week. But it is also about reforms that the post office is going to make itself.
The current Postmaster General, Louis DeJoy, has embarked on an ambitious plan to transform the Postal Service by finding efficiencies, including transforming existing capabilities to more efficiently meet the needs of the American people. He is taking on a 10-year plan to make certain changes to make the post office more efficient, but he has made clear to us that he needs the financial space to do that. He needs some headroom here by us making some important changes here in Congress.
We have a role to play too. This is what we do:
First, we eliminate a burdensome and unique prefunding requirement for retiree health benefits. Congress mandated this back in 2006 for current employees, regardless of age. That has crippled the Postal Service financially. Prefunding of retiree health benefits is not something that anybody else has to do. It is really uniquely the post office. The Federal Government does not do that. The private sector does not do that. In fact, very few private sector entities, of course, offer retiree health benefits. They rely on Medicare. So the Federal Government doesn't do it. The private sector doesn't do it. Why is the post office doing it? That is a good question. We are just trying to bring the post office in line with what everybody else is doing with regard to retiree health benefits.
Second, it requires Postal Service employees who are retiring--who have been paying into Medicare their entire career, by the way--to actually enroll in Medicare Part B and Part D. Everybody is in Part A, but about 25 percent of postal employees are not in Part B. Instead, they rely on the Federal employee health benefit plan, which is far more expensive.
This includes the ability for these post office retirees to get into Medicare Advantage. That is very important to me. So just like happens under current opportunities to enroll in Medicare Advantage under the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, they would be able to use the Medicare Advantage Program, which I like. It is kind of a wraparound program that gives you more opportunities for more options and benefits. It is more like a private sector plan. A lot of my constituents in Ohio like it and use it.
Currently, again, about 25 percent of postal employees don't enroll in Medicare even though they are eligible for it. Again, they paid their HI payroll tax, the HI tax you see on your paycheck. This means the Postal Service is currently paying higher premiums for FEHB than other public or private sector employers who require Medicare. This is a big savings for them.
Third, it requires the Postal Service to maintain its current standard of 6-day-a-week delivery through an integrated delivery network of mail and packages. This was important to a lot of my colleagues--particularly those representing rural areas--that they keep this 6-day-a-week delivery. It is important to the guy who is from Butler County who gets his COPD medication through the mail. So it requires the post office to continue to do that even while finding other efficiencies.
In terms of the integrated delivery network of mail and packages together, it underscores through a rule of construction that this has no impact on existing rules governing how the Postal Service attributes costs between packages and mail.
Let me repeat that. We provide for an integrated delivery system of mail and packages, and that makes sense. If you are going to deliver mail to somebody, you should also be delivering the package, right? That is much more efficient. But we say that this has no impact on existing rules governing how the Postal Service attributes costs between packages and mail.
This is important to me because this makes sure that the private sector will not be subject to unfair competition.
In addition to doing all of these things, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the bill will result in a little more than $1 billion in savings in outlays and $458 million in savings in direct spending.
The bottom line is, the Congressional Budget Office, CBO, the nonpartisan group up here in Congress, has looked at this and said there is going to be a $1.5 billion savings to the taxpayer because of this legislation--$1.5 billion savings to the taxpayer.
Because it makes sense, this legislation received strong bipartisan support when it was taken up in the House of Representatives. In fact, it was passed by a vote of 342 to 92. Not much gets passed with those kinds of big bipartisan numbers these days. Republicans and Democrats alike looked at this and said: You know, the post office is in trouble. We have to do something.
Some say: Well, this may not be perfect. Well, it is not perfect. Nothing is around here. But it is a whole lot better than the alternative, and it does get the post office back on track. Again, along with the reforms that are being undertaken at the Postal Service itself, this legislation gives them the financial breathing room they need to be able to save the post office.
I encourage my colleagues to join me in supporting this bill. Let's put the post office in a position to succeed and provide those essential services that small businesses, veterans, and rural constituents rely on so much.
I appreciate working with my colleague Senator Peters on this over time to find consensus. Both sides had to make concessions to get to this point. We have ended up with a good bill. Let's pass this bill and ensure that the post office is healthy for our constituents moving forward.
I yield the floor.
____________________
SOURCE: Congressional Record Vol. 168, No. 37
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