Last Wednesday, Sept. 26, the U.S. Postal Service announced that it will not make the scheduled payment of $5.6 billion to prefund retiree health benefits, which was due Sunday, Sept. 30.

The payment was mandated by Congress under a 2006 law and has been a source of controversy among union workers in the postal service. Some believe, as the BNT reported back in July, that it is the source of troubles in the Postal Service. Specifically, why the Service has been proposed to undergo through through so many cuts.

The announcement noted, "Comprehensive reform of the laws governing the Postal Service is urgently needed in order for the Postal Service to fully implement its five-year business plan and return to long-term financial stability."

The American Postal Workers Union (APWU) pointed out in a press release, "The announcement failed to note that the mandated payment is an artificial debt that Congress has not imposed on any other entity, supposedly to fund benefits to employees who have not even been born." Nor did the release mention that the previous payments totaling $22 billion have nearly wiped out the Postal Service's $15 billion line of credit, after having erased an operating profit of over $6 billion for 2007-2008."

The press release was authored by David Yao, who was interviewed by the BNT and who participated in a hunger strike to show that the federal government was unfairly "starving" the postal service of funding.

The Postal Service is eyeing the possibility of reducing delivery days, ending delivery to customers' doors and slashing rural post office hours. In addition, the Service plans to slow local first class mail transport in February of 2014 from next-day to two-day delivery.

Yao states in the press release that the Postal Service has inflated financial losses, providing justification of drastic cuts. He and other union workers believe that the cuts are unwarranted and unnecessary.