Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I would like to address a number of statements my good friend Senator Collins has made about the FECA provisions in this bill. First, it has been argued these changes are necessary to save the Postal Service money. However, since most employees affected by these cuts are not postal employees, the savings expected from these changes would have very little effect on the Postal Service's deficit. In fact, according to CBO, these changes would actually cost the Postal Service an additional $21 million in the first 3 years. In addition, it has been said on the floor that the FECA recipients over retirement age get 26 percent more income than similar employees who work their entire career and retire under the normal retirement systems. This statistic comes from a recent GAO report that looked at only a small sample of nonpostal workers, eligible for CSCS retirement. In fact, according to GAO, their recent report only examines 8 percent of the active Federal workforce and does not even look at the Postal Service workers. Cuts should not be made to FECA benefits until GAO completes a more comprehensive study, now underway, which examines the impact of benefit reductions on FERS participants. The Senate has not considered FECA legislation since 2006, and the only hearing was the one I held last year.…”