The Malaysian Insider :: Features
The Malaysian Insider :: Features |
| US Post Office job cuts threaten black middle class Posted: 20 Jan 2013 06:54 AM PST  Reuters file pic of a US post office worker delivering mail. "There would be no middle class without these jobs - it would either be rich or poor," said Dortch-Hardy, a tall, energetic 38-year-old, who took long strides as she wheeled her cart along a row of two and three-story brick apartment houses. The cash-strapped US Postal Service has eliminated 168,000 jobs since 2006, and more cuts could result as it struggles to avoid its own "fiscal cliff." As the United States honours Martin Luther King's civil rights legacy on Monday, many African-American workers may be facing new obstacles to achieving and maintaining a middle-class life style. African-Americans represent 13.1 per cent of the US population and 11.6 per cent of the labour force, according to a 2012 US Department of Labor report. Nearly one in five African-American workers hold government jobs such as mail clerks, firefighters and teachers, the report said. "There's a long tradition of the public sector being more friendly, or less hostile, to African-American workers," said Robert Zieger, emeritus professor of history at the University of Florida in Gainesville. "The Post Office is the best example." African-Americans make up about 20 per cent of US Postal Service workers - and are the majority in some urban centres, representing 75 per cent to 80 per cent of the 5,000 letter carriers in the Chicago area, according to Mack Julion, president of the Chicago branch of the National Association of Letter Carriers. But the public sector has cut nearly 600,000 jobs since 2009, due to shrinking government budgets and a range of other issues, according to the Bureau of Labor Relations. The slower recovery for African-Americans in the labor market has, in part, been the result of government layoffs after the end of the recession was declared, according to the DOL report. In December, the black unemployment rate was 14 per cent, roughly double that of whites. While some other sectors of the economy are seeing recovery, the biggest problems may be just beginning for the Post Office, the nation's second-largest civilian employer after Wal-Mart with about 536,000 career workers. Postal troubles The Postal Service has been hurt by a switch to electronic mail from paper communication, as well as onerous retiree payments to the government. Last week, the Postal Service Board of Governors met to discuss a range of cost-cutting measures to strengthen the service's finances following the loss of a staggering US$15.9 billion (RM47.89 billion) in fiscal year 2012. The Postal Service, self-funded by postage sales, blames most of the losses on a pre-funding requirement enacted by Congress in 2006 that requires it to make annual payments of nearly US$5.5 billion in health benefits for future retirees. The U.S. Congress has not been able to agree on legislation to overhaul the agency. The postmaster general has proposed eliminating Saturday mail delivery, closing some facilities and changing its benefit payment obligations, but congressional approval is needed for the more significant measures. With no action by Congress, the postal service is losing US$25 million a day, by some estimates, and could run out of money by October. "I'm afraid that Congress is going to fiddle while the Post Office burns," said Philip Rubio, assistant professor of history at North Carolina A&T State University in Greensboro. A place for jobs Why are there so many African-Americans in the Post Office? Because historically it was less prone to racial discrimination than other employers and offered a way out of poverty, says Rubio, a former postal worker and author of the book "There's Always Work at the Post Office: African American Postal Workers and the Fight for Jobs, Justice and Equality." In 1865, the US Post Office opened to black workers. The jobs were attractive to educated African-Americans who found their skills were not appreciated in the private sector, Rubio said. Former postal workers of note include novelist Richard Wright and actor Sherman Hemsley. "It became a magnet for African-Americans who gravitated to the one place where they could take the test and they knew once they got in and became career employees, they were set," Rubio said. By World War I, 10 percent of the Postal Service's work force was African-American. After an executive order by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1941 banned discrimination in the government and defense industries, there was a sharp rise in postal employment among African-American men and women, Rubio said. "Public service, particularly for African-Americans, was an opportunity — all you need is a high school diploma," said Julion. Dortch-Hardy took the Postal Service test after graduating from high school on Chicago's South Side, but there were no openings, and she did not get a job immediately. She moved to Memphis, attended college and worked in a bank. But when the Post Office called — she jumped at the chance for better pay and benefits, and returned to Chicago. Except for very hot or heavy-snow days, and the time she had to jump over a fence while pregnant to escape a ferocious dog, she has enjoyed her 15 years of service. Without it, she feels she might have to work two or three retail jobs to provide adequately for her four children, the oldest of whom is about to start college. And while she and her husband, also a postal worker, are not worried about losing their jobs, she says: "I do worry about the people coming in now." Ripple effects Julion said that the loss of more Postal Service jobs would be devastating - not only to African-American communities, but all communities who rely on postal jobs and service. For example, the Postal Service is the largest employer of veterans in the nation, after the Department of Defense. The national average annual salary of career employees who work directly with mail, such as letter carriers, is $53,000 to $55,000, said a Chicago Post Office spokesman. "These are homeowners — people with mortgages and car notes," Julion said. "They are big players in their community in terms of what resources they bring to the table. They are the ones going to the barber shops, the beauty shops, the Ma and Pa shops in the neighborhoods - if you take those incomes away, it's going to be devastating." The solution, he said, is not just to get another job - if all that's available is retail posts that cannot support a household. Even many professional jobs do not pay enough, said Julion, a father of four, who left a job as an addictions counselor to join the Postal Service because it paid better. Amisha Patel, head of Chicago's Grassroots Collaborative, whose aim is to improve worker conditions, said that the problem of crime in minority urban communities is often blamed on gangs and bad parenting. But another factor is the availability of work, with job losses leading to foreclosures and ruined neighborhoods, Patel said. "You've seen a steady decimation of good-paying jobs, which are very much linked to the public sector." Rubio said he hopes that President Barack Obama, who recently announced executive orders on gun control, might consider taking similar executive action to save the Postal Service, rather than waiting on Congress. It would be a "sad irony" if the Postal Service, a booster of minority prospects since the Civil War, should unravel under the first black President, he said. "I don't think anything now is unfixable," said Rubio. But if nothing is done, the damage to mail service and postal jobs "would be very hard to undo." — Reuters |
| Hoping to revive an ancient tongue, Pope tweets in Latin Posted: 20 Jan 2013 06:51 AM PST  Reuters file pic of Pope Benedict. "Unitati christifidelium integre studentes quid iubet Dominus? Orare semper, iustitiam factitare, amare probitatem, humiles Secum ambulare," the pontiff wrote. Baffled? So were many Twitter users. "Benny, nobody understands a word of Latin! #adviceforthepope" read one response on the online messaging service. The pope's tweet meant: "What does the Lord command to those wholly eager for the unity of those following Christ? To always pray, to continually do justice, to love uprightness, to walk humbly with Him," according to University of Cambridge scholar Tamer Nawar. The message was shorter and, arguably, more elegant in its original language - one of the reasons why Latin-lovers want to conserve the tongue of ancient Rome, Pope Benedict foremost among them. The Holy See, where even ATM bank machine transactions are available in Latin, is one of the last bastions of the language that gave rise to Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian and Romanian. In November the pope set up a new Vatican department charged with promoting the study and use of the language within the Roman Catholic Church and beyond. Known for his traditionalist leanings, the 85-year old pontiff has also allowed a partial return of the old-style Latin Mass that was phased out more than four decades ago. Once the international language of science and learning, Latin has declined in use among priests since the Church began allowing them to hold masses in vernacular languages in the mid 1960s. To keep the language updated, Vatican produces a dictionary of modern words in the ancient tongue. "Inscriptio cursus electronici" is the vital word "email", while "brevissimae bracae femineae" means hotpants. With just over 5,000 followers, the pope's Latin-language Twitter account is the smallest of his eight profiles, through which he communicates with more than 2 million followers in languages including Arabic and his native German. However, Sunday's Tweet was not actually the first instance of Latin used by the Pope on Twitter. Benedict's Twitter handle 'Pontifex' is a Latin word literally meaning "bridge-builder", an ancient title for high priest once held by the emperors of Rome. — Reuters |
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