Canada Post, the federal postal service, is in theory a standalone Crown corporation that should be operating at arm's length at cost.
In reality, it's a bloated, archaic government institution weighed down by lazy entitled workers, commie public sector unions and frequent demands for government bailouts.
Lettermail isn't economically feasible in a large and sparsely populated country like Canada despite increasing the price of a stamp to 1.24. Lettermail volumes are dropping with the move to e-bills, etc. Postal service is still considered an essential service however despite the business model no longer being feasible. Pretty much every podunk town has a branded post office no matter how small. Some of the actual branded post offices are being outcompeted as well with corporate Canada Post kiosk being put inside major pharmacy chains staffed by jeets.
Canada Post has also been having their lunch being eaten in terms of package delivery by the private corpo outfits like UPS & Fedex, along with Amazon employing jeets to deliver packages directly to online buyers doorstep. Canada Post actually tends to be the cheapest option for package delivery (other than Amazon), but they have huge legacy unionized labour costs and tend to be much slower than all the other options.
For decades dating back to the Conservative, pre-Justin Trudeau years with PM Stephen Harper, there's been a push by the feds to implement Community Mail Boxes (CMBs) with new builds and trying to convert some existing areas instead if at-home mail delivery. The Community Mailboxes are either roadside Canada Post branded metal lockers where residents are expected to pick up their mail by key a block or two from their house. Or in some instances, get an actual mail slot at the local Post Office itself.
Most new builds in Canada already have Community Mail Boxes implemented instead of door-to-door delivery. A decade plus ago, Conservative PM Stephen Harper tried to cut mail delivery costs by announcing that older builds and boomers would also be converted to CMBs. There was much REEEEing from leftists and seniors and boomers and commies and the disabled that stopping their delivery right to their door for lettermail was fascism. Harper backed off in the end.
Canada Post's finances, volume, market share and relevancy continued to diminish over the decade of Trudeau rule. There was a month-long Canada Post strike over Christmas in 2024 when Justin's Liberals tried to get letter carriers to actually work a full day. Canada Post has a workplace culture that mailmen could go home as soon as their route was done, with predictable consequences. The Christmas 2024 strike was over proposed changes to overhaul the division of labour so that letter carriers would be expected to return to the depot to be assigned a full day's work.
The 2024 countrywide Christmas strike was big news with the boomers over the busiest season of the year. Boomers were forced to go physically to Canada Post's competitors like Fedex and UPS to mail gifts to their grandkids, paying 4-6x markups.
With management and the labour unions unable to make progress and the work stoppage essentially shutting down lettermail, package delivery and distribution of physical gibs cheques for weeks, Trudeau eventually punted, legislating the mailmen back to work, kicking the can down the road to arbitration in May 2025.
In the meantime, Trudeau's personal popularity caused him to step down, he prorogued Parliament for months, also shutting down government. He eventually quit allowing Mark Carney to be installed and Trump's gay ass 51st state rhetoric gave boomers enough Elbows up TDS to bring Carney officially to power at the end of April.
Not really sure what happened in May with arbitration, Trudeau gone and a freshly placed Mark Carney in office.
The current work stoppage is because Canada Post management wants to end door-to-door delivery for everyone again just like Harper tried to. Carney wants everyone to have to pick up their own mail at the Community Mailboxes, stopping the two-tier system that's trudged along for decades where boomers get letters to their door and everyone else gets the shitty boxes. Again there's the "Think about the elderly & the disabled" from the usual sources.
The letter carriers announced that they'd stop delivering commercial flyers as a retaliatory tactic, which is one of the last revenue streams actually keeping the bloated and dying Crown corp afloat.
I'm fine with Canada Post ending home delivery altogether. There's too much entitlement from those legacy citizens who still have it simply because they literally won the postal code lottery.
There are some suggestions to reduce the number of business days lettermail is delivered down to 2-3 from 5. I don't think this really solves many of their structural problems.
The unions most likely have to be broken. Being a mailman isn't a skilled profession. Their pay isn't exorbitant, but their work ethic & entitlement is definitely part of the problems with the workplace culture.
There's probably an argument to nationalize the postal service once again as a public service rather than trying to pretend that it's a quasi-private entity expected to break even. That way, Canada Post can get right out of the competitive package delivery and commercial flyer stuffing aspects that are simply purely about revenue generation.
There's also a pretty big rural/urban divide to the future need for Canada Post. In urban settings, the post office isn't really needed anymore besides sending out physical gibs cheques (which also could be eliminated with direct deposit).
In rural areas, the physical Post Office is one of the last vestiges of Main Street and small town infrastructure. These physical locations should likely be repurposed in some way to remain as post offices/community mailboxes while expanding to also provide other small town commerical or government services.
There was some harebrained scheme that Canada Post was going to try to enter the banking sector and provide some sort of financial services. This specifically seems like an awful idea, but their role does need to modernize and diversity in some way, especially in small town Canada.
can i get a tldr. idk wtf is going on
Canada Post, the federal postal service, is in theory a standalone Crown corporation that should be operating at arm's length at cost.
In reality, it's a bloated, archaic government institution weighed down by lazy entitled workers, commie public sector unions and frequent demands for government bailouts.
Lettermail isn't economically feasible in a large and sparsely populated country like Canada despite increasing the price of a stamp to 1.24. Lettermail volumes are dropping with the move to e-bills, etc. Postal service is still considered an essential service however despite the business model no longer being feasible. Pretty much every podunk town has a branded post office no matter how small. Some of the actual branded post offices are being outcompeted as well with corporate Canada Post kiosk being put inside major pharmacy chains staffed by jeets.
Canada Post has also been having their lunch being eaten in terms of package delivery by the private corpo outfits like UPS & Fedex, along with Amazon employing jeets to deliver packages directly to online buyers doorstep. Canada Post actually tends to be the cheapest option for package delivery (other than Amazon), but they have huge legacy unionized labour costs and tend to be much slower than all the other options.
For decades dating back to the Conservative, pre-Justin Trudeau years with PM Stephen Harper, there's been a push by the feds to implement Community Mail Boxes (CMBs) with new builds and trying to convert some existing areas instead if at-home mail delivery. The Community Mailboxes are either roadside Canada Post branded metal lockers where residents are expected to pick up their mail by key a block or two from their house. Or in some instances, get an actual mail slot at the local Post Office itself.
Most new builds in Canada already have Community Mail Boxes implemented instead of door-to-door delivery. A decade plus ago, Conservative PM Stephen Harper tried to cut mail delivery costs by announcing that older builds and boomers would also be converted to CMBs. There was much REEEEing from leftists and seniors and boomers and commies and the disabled that stopping their delivery right to their door for lettermail was fascism. Harper backed off in the end.
Canada Post's finances, volume, market share and relevancy continued to diminish over the decade of Trudeau rule. There was a month-long Canada Post strike over Christmas in 2024 when Justin's Liberals tried to get letter carriers to actually work a full day. Canada Post has a workplace culture that mailmen could go home as soon as their route was done, with predictable consequences. The Christmas 2024 strike was over proposed changes to overhaul the division of labour so that letter carriers would be expected to return to the depot to be assigned a full day's work.
The 2024 countrywide Christmas strike was big news with the boomers over the busiest season of the year. Boomers were forced to go physically to Canada Post's competitors like Fedex and UPS to mail gifts to their grandkids, paying 4-6x markups.
With management and the labour unions unable to make progress and the work stoppage essentially shutting down lettermail, package delivery and distribution of physical gibs cheques for weeks, Trudeau eventually punted, legislating the mailmen back to work, kicking the can down the road to arbitration in May 2025.
In the meantime, Trudeau's personal popularity caused him to step down, he prorogued Parliament for months, also shutting down government. He eventually quit allowing Mark Carney to be installed and Trump's gay ass 51st state rhetoric gave boomers enough Elbows up TDS to bring Carney officially to power at the end of April.
Not really sure what happened in May with arbitration, Trudeau gone and a freshly placed Mark Carney in office.
The current work stoppage is because Canada Post management wants to end door-to-door delivery for everyone again just like Harper tried to. Carney wants everyone to have to pick up their own mail at the Community Mailboxes, stopping the two-tier system that's trudged along for decades where boomers get letters to their door and everyone else gets the shitty boxes. Again there's the "Think about the elderly & the disabled" from the usual sources.
The letter carriers announced that they'd stop delivering commercial flyers as a retaliatory tactic, which is one of the last revenue streams actually keeping the bloated and dying Crown corp afloat.
Thanks! What’s the solution. What would you do?
Shoot mail at houses into a chute by using an air cannon.
Not 100% sure TBH.
I'm fine with Canada Post ending home delivery altogether. There's too much entitlement from those legacy citizens who still have it simply because they literally won the postal code lottery.
There are some suggestions to reduce the number of business days lettermail is delivered down to 2-3 from 5. I don't think this really solves many of their structural problems.
The unions most likely have to be broken. Being a mailman isn't a skilled profession. Their pay isn't exorbitant, but their work ethic & entitlement is definitely part of the problems with the workplace culture.
There's probably an argument to nationalize the postal service once again as a public service rather than trying to pretend that it's a quasi-private entity expected to break even. That way, Canada Post can get right out of the competitive package delivery and commercial flyer stuffing aspects that are simply purely about revenue generation.
There's also a pretty big rural/urban divide to the future need for Canada Post. In urban settings, the post office isn't really needed anymore besides sending out physical gibs cheques (which also could be eliminated with direct deposit).
In rural areas, the physical Post Office is one of the last vestiges of Main Street and small town infrastructure. These physical locations should likely be repurposed in some way to remain as post offices/community mailboxes while expanding to also provide other small town commerical or government services.
There was some harebrained scheme that Canada Post was going to try to enter the banking sector and provide some sort of financial services. This specifically seems like an awful idea, but their role does need to modernize and diversity in some way, especially in small town Canada.