Susan Collins: “today, I rise to offer to the Senate some good news for our mailers and, indeed, anyone who uses the United States…”

“today, I rise to offer to the Senate some good news for our mailers and, indeed, anyone who uses the United States Postal Service. The USPS, which has been losing significant amounts of money in recent years despite repeated increases in postage rates, has determined that its finances are in better order than previously thought. If Congress acts expeditiously on legislation that I am introducing today along with my colleague, Senator Carper, the Postal Service will avoid an imminent rate hike. In recent years, the United States Postal Service has been raising postal rates at a rapid pace. When the USPS last raised rates in 2002, it was the third such rate increase during an 18-month period. Such steep, irregular rate increases make it very difficult for businesses to plan for their postal costs. This is a particular problem for catalog companies and magazine publishers, which set their prices in advance based on assumptions about postal rates. Mailing costs for some smaller catalog businesses, I am told, now can exceed production costs. In so many ways, postage rate increases have a significant economic impact.”