I guess you all have heard that the Postal Service will be cut to 5 days only
per week. No Saturday mail delivery, beginning 7/1 I think they said.
On PBS The McLaughlin Group last night John McL said he expects to see
Pres. Obama impliment aNational Sales Tax, beginning possibly in the first
or second quarter.
__________________
May you always have..Love to Share, Health to Spare, and Friends that Care!
I guess you all have heard that the Postal Service will be cut to 5 days only
per week. No Saturday mail delivery, beginning 7/1 I think they said.
They seem to be missing a day of delivery here and there in my neck of the woods already! A week or so back, we got maybe 2 inches of snow, not a big deal for anyone, even 2 wheel drive cars. The trash collectors came around as scheduled, no problem. Didn't see hide nor hair of that mailman though!
Take a look at what they're trying in Finland (from Fox News).
Quote:
Love letters, payslips and overdue bills will not be spared when Finland's post starts opening mail and sending scanned copies to selected recipients in a trial aimed at cutting costs and emissions.
Volunteers will receive an e-mail or a mobile phone text message when their mail has been opened, scanned and sent as a PDF file to a secure digital mailbox, to which only the recipient has access, a post official told AFP.
"This (secure digital mailbox) is totally different from e-mail. It is comparable to Web banking," said Tommi Tikka, development director at state-owned Itella, which runs the Nordic country's postal system.
The "highly automated" conversion of letters into electronic documents would be conducted in "special, secured premises" where staff are bound by strict confidentiality obligations, Tikka said, insisting that the initiative was not an April Fools joke.
"Itella is doing in Finland what the KGB did in its time in the Soviet Union and the Stasi in East Germany. Itella is reading people's private mail," one commentator using the name "Itella agentti" or "Itella agent," said on a debate forum hosted by leading daily Helsingin Sanomat.
But Tikka insisted the service complied with correspondence secrecy laws and everyone who had volunteered for the trial had signed an agreement with Itella for their post to be opened and converted into an electronic format.
"Our workers do not read the mail. How could love letters be filtered out?" said Tikka, adding Itella would not keep copies of letters.
"We want to find out what kind of content clients want to start receiving electronically ... Are personal letters among those that are not wanted in a digital form? We will find out," he said.
The size and bulk of envelopes would be analyzed to filter out mail not suited for scanning, and those obviously containing items such as bank cards or voting ballots would not be opened, Tikka said.
So far, 126 households and 20 businesses in Anttila, an area of scattered settlement in the southern town of Porvoo, had volunteered to join the trial, which starts in the week of April 12 and runs until the end of the year.
And those who long for the scent and feel of stationery need not despair: once scanned, correspondence will be returned to its envelope and delivered in the normal fashion. But the postman will only call twice a week at the homes of participating residents. Deliveries to mailboxes at a local store will be made three times a week.
"This is purely a trial. We don't know yet whether, at the end of the year, there will be aspects of this that could be applied more widely," Tikka said.
The Technical Research Center of Finland (VTT) is working with Itella to evaluate the environmental impact of what Tikka called a "living lab experiment."
Love letters, payslips and overdue bills will not be spared when Finland's post starts opening mail and sending scanned copies to selected recipients in a trial aimed at cutting costs and emissions.
Volunteers will receive an e-mail or a mobile phone text message when their mail has been opened, scanned and sent as a PDF file to a secure digital mailbox, to which only the recipient has access, a post official told AFP.
"This (secure digital mailbox) is totally different from e-mail. It is comparable to Web banking," said Tommi Tikka, development director at state-owned Itella, which runs the Nordic country's postal system.
The "highly automated" conversion of letters into electronic documents would be conducted in "special, secured premises" where staff are bound by strict confidentiality obligations, Tikka said, insisting that the initiative was not an April Fools joke.
Love letters and other personal messages would not be spared in the experiment, which has generated lively online discussion in high-tech Finland, home to top mobile phone maker Nokia.
"Itella is doing in Finland what the KGB did in its time in the Soviet Union and the Stasi in East Germany. Itella is reading people's private mail," one commentator using the name "Itella agentti" or "Itella agent," said on a debate forum hosted by leading daily Helsingin Sanomat.
But Tikka insisted the service complied with correspondence secrecy laws and everyone who had volunteered for the trial had signed an agreement with Itella for their post to be opened and converted into an electronic format.
"Our workers do not read the mail. How could love letters be filtered out?" said Tikka, adding Itella would not keep copies of letters.
"We want to find out what kind of content clients want to start receiving electronically ... Are personal letters among those that are not wanted in a digital form? We will find out," he said.
The size and bulk of envelopes would be analyzed to filter out mail not suited for scanning, and those obviously containing items such as bank cards or voting ballots would not be opened, Tikka said.
So far, 126 households and 20 businesses in Anttila, an area of scattered settlement in the southern town of Porvoo, had volunteered to join the trial, which starts in the week of April 12 and runs until the end of the year.
And those who long for the scent and feel of stationery need not despair: once scanned, correspondence will be returned to its envelope and delivered in the normal fashion. But the postman will only call twice a week at the homes of participating residents. Deliveries to mailboxes at a local store will be made three times a week.
"This is purely a trial. We don't know yet whether, at the end of the year, there will be aspects of this that could be applied more widely," Tikka said.
The Technical Research Center of Finland (VTT) is working with Itella to evaluate the environmental impact of what Tikka called a "living lab experiment."
__________________ "We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals." ~Immanual Kant~
On PBS The McLaughlin Group last night John McL said he expects to see
Pres. Obama impliment aNational Sales Tax, beginning possibly in the first
or second quarter.
It is probably going to be a similar tax to the one which is used in European countries. Its called a Value Added Tax, rates are different in each country but can be up to 20%.
It probably means you can be paying up to 20% more for your basic items such as gas,electricity and water as well as any goods you buy.
The whole thing is a bureacratic nightmare with thousands of extra government accounting staff. VAT is collected at each stage of sale of a product ie manufacturers profit, wholesalers profit, retailers profit before
reaching the consumer and they are each responsible for collecting this tax for the government which increases the price of goods and services.
But when your $8 trillion in debt how else is Obama going to pay for healthcare reform?
Yup, Liverock, my thoughts exactly; "How else will Obama pay for health care
reform?" However, I really don't mind the switch to 5 days except I'd rather
have the off day be a Wednesday, so only 1 day off between mails 2x a week.
Canada, Australia and several other countries have been on 5 days only for
years. There's been a recent discussion on Care2 about it and where I got
this info. One woman said she asked her mail carrier about it and he told her
that some mail carriers will be let go - no jobs unless they go by attrition,
letting older ones retire.
On the VAT tax - I think another name might be a Consumption Tax.
Hopefully, food and meds would still be exempt, but another tax on utilities
of any kind would really hurt those least able to afford it - seniors on SS only
or seniors on SS plus tiny pensions, the already poor and barely making it, etc.
Even IF food is exempt, items like TTissue, soaps, etc. Our UTEs already are
taxed to the hilt - school, local, etc. I recently saw on TV that some states are
already taxing haircuts, other services.
I'm betting it will be a 6% or 7% national sales tax and this all sounds Extremely Inflationary to me!
US Postal Service in 2011!
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