Welcome to My Site

If this is your first visit, welcome! This site is devoted to my life experiences as a Filipino-American who immigrated from the Philippines to the United States in 1960. I came to the US as a graduate student when I was 26 years old. I am now in my mid-80's and thanks God for his blessings, I have four successful and professional children and six grandchildren here in the US. My wife and I had been enjoying the snow bird lifestyle between US and Philippines after my retirement from USFDA in 2002. Macrine(RIP),Me and my oldest son are the Intellectual migrants. Were were born in the Philippines, came to the US in 1960 and later became US citizens in 1972. Some of the photos and videos in this site, I do not own. However, I have no intention on infringing on your copyrights. Cheers!

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Save the Post Office! Mail your Card Greetings via USPS

This Post Office is Saved: Thanks to my wife and a few others who still mail birthday and other card greetings to Relatives and Friends -Photo from kensavage.com

My wife*(see note 1) is still using the postal service to mail birthday cards greetings to her relatives in The Philippines. I used my FaceBook account or electronic card via e-mail to send birthday greetings to relatives and friends here in US and in the Philippines. My wife has no FB account, so she is trying to help the USPS financially by mailing her card greetings to relatives and friends in the Philippines. I still mail via post office about 10% of my monthly bills, the rest of my bills is paid by automatic deduction on-line from my bank account. But in spite of our help to keep the Postal Service in business, the following announcement in last week newspapers attracted my attention. One station identified is near us here in the Sacramento Area. The closure of these offices will add to the depressing unemployment statistics**(see note 2 below) in the US.

"The Postal Service has marked 677 post offices nationwide for possible closure or consolidation, according to a listing provided to Congressional staffers by the U.S. Postal Service. The closure is part of cost cutting measure proposed by the USPS to the US Government Post Regulatory Commission.

The hearing, titled “Making Sense of It All: An Examination of USPS’s Station and Branch Optimization Initiative and Delivery Route Adjustments” heard that the Postal Service is expected to lose approximately $7.1 billion by the end of FY 2009. The USPS proposed to cut these loses through a combination of post office closures, price increases and other efficiency drives.(What?,another increase in postal rates!)

Not helping the USPS is a drop in mail volume caused by consumers switch online for information previously received by mail, and recession hit companies looking to reduce their mail volume by emailing accounts.

The proposed cuts are expected to save $1 billion annually. The “Post Office closing list” contains post offices that have been “identified” for full study for closure, meaning that all might not close".

How about you? What percent of your bills is still paid by mail instead of on-line?
Do you still send birthday greetings by snail mail? How often do you mail packages through the post office? Who is next in line? I am predicting the manufacturers of Birthday, Easter, and Christmas cards will soon be also losing money unless they diversify and sell other products.

Note 1*: The recipient of my wife's birthday greeting card was her first cousin in the Philippines. Her cousin called her today to thank her for the card. Her cousin reiterated to her that it is no longer customary to send birthday cards by mail, so he is really appreciative of the gesture. Last year she sent the same cousin a birthday card. I told my wife then why just sent him an electronic card via e-mail or just greet him in my Face Book account. My wife says she is not too comfortable doing on-line work and it is much easier for her to send the card by post office mail. I hope there are still several hundred thousands of senior citizens( or not) who are not comfortable using the computer. They will be the saviour of the US Postal Service.

Note 2**: The number of jobless in the U. S., according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, rose to 9.2 (14.1 million individuals) percent for the month of June, up a percentage point from May. That is the official number. But if one considers the marginally attached, the part-timers that are underemployed (hopeful of gaining full-time or more meaningful employment), and the discouraged (no longer looking for work), the statistics are actually higher -- 16.2 percent (24.9 million individuals).

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

It seems that your wife is still living in the previous century. The postal service is an archaic system and will become obsolete in a few decades, if not yet now. You must be hogging the computer too much for your blogs and FB, and your wife is too polite to ask you to take time off from your internet activities. Loving is sharing and share the computer with her.

To take a step further, create her own Facebook page and teach her how to use it. I did start my grandma's FB page, now she's very addicted she no longer calls me all the time. She hardly sends me messages, she must be on the prowl for hot older men in Facebook.

One day she will no longer need the USPS, and you two will be fighting over the computer use. By then I suggest you buy a notebook for her. Have a beautiful day.


Kathy Rea

David B Katague said...

Hi Kathy, Thank you for your comment. With regards to your comment on my hogging the computer, is not really true, because my wife has her own PC with a smaller monitor. My PC monitor is as big as a small TV, since I watch movies in the internet instead of the TV. My wife is just not comfortable with the PC and complains about her eyes. I always share with her the family news in FaceBook, thus she has no incentive in opening her own account. Cheers!

Anonymous said...

A lot of older people are afraid of accepting change with the newer technologies available. Some of them don't use ATM machines, cell phones, fax machines and computers. They own answering machines, DVD/VCR/DVR, cable, and other devices which they never fully utilize. They are afraid those things won't work and feel they are complicated to operate.

My folks have computers which they never use. They wait for their children or grandchildren to operate it for them. I set them up for e-mails and Facebook which they never read and open until the young ones show them their messages. The young once need to be coaxed to use their computers.

Saving the USPS is a lost cause, it has to adapt to changes, they have to trim itself and improve its efficiency, like any other business in this day and age.

Ruben Mendoza

David B Katague said...

Hi Ruben, your feedback is very much appreciated. Incidentally, how did find about my site? Have a Good day or night whereever you are. It is nice to know that I have readers that adds to the usefulness of this site through their comments.

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