JamesSep 25, 2025
Martin Settle

Canada Post is a service, not a consumer product. The idea that it operates at a "loss" is stupid. It's like saying schools operate at a loss; hospitals operate at a loss; roads operate at a loss; sewers operates at a loss.

We pay for public services collectively, because they are simply needed for our society for function and for everyone to have (relatively) equal access to participate in culture/society/democracy.

Stop reducing necessary services to an income statement!
#cdnpoli #canadapost

Sep 25, 2025 at 6:52pmWeb
Show threadCyber SlayerSep 25, 2025
@Martin Oh no, is Canada having this ridiculous discussion now too?
Show threadDwight Williams (💉 x9)+😷🇨🇦Sep 25, 2025
@cyb3rslayer @Martin Afraid so.
Show threadSeán FenianSep 25, 2025
@Martin Reducing everything to a quarterly balance sheet is how the MBAs gutted American industry. The fatal flaw of the ivy-league-business-school theory of bottom line management is that if you manage only based on the bottom line of the balance sheet, your management cannot take into account things that cannot be trivially reduced to a single number on a balance sheet. It's hard to quantify, for example, institutional expertise or customer goodwill — and that means that to an MBA, those things have no value.

If you look at schools this way, they operate at a loss. Try closing them all to save money, and see how that decision looks to you ten or fifteen years down the road.

But MBAs don't LOOK ten or fifteen years down the road. That's the distant future to them, and the distant future is by definition Somebody Else's Problem.

If you look at it in a narrow enough way, all investment looks like a loss. Because you don't get the return from it right now.

Schools are an investment in a nation's future. So is healthcare. A nation that won't invest in either, or both, is saying that it doesn't care whether it has a future.
Show threadTilda Moose, citizenSep 25, 2025
@Martin
We've had exactly the same view/problem in the UK. Fight for your nationalised infrastructure! Our services have been privatised to death. Our post offices have all but gone, our water bills are ridiculous, our rivers and beaches full of sewage and farm runoff... let not-so-great Britain be a warning to you. (Help, we're a bit shit here)
Show threadDwight Williams (💉 x9)+😷🇨🇦Sep 25, 2025
@Martin Amen. Canada Post should never have stopped being a federal department.
Show threadToni AittoniemiSep 25, 2025
@Martin neoliberalism is cancer!
Show threadcontrasocialSep 25, 2025

@Martin

Oh god, they're trying that old chestnut in Canada now?

Take it from an American, you stamp that shit out as hard as you can.

Show threadBenjaminGormanSep 25, 2025
@Martin There was a jurisdiction in Tennesee where they converted the fire department into a for-profit enterprise. People bought policies, and when people couldn't afford it, firefighters would show up, water the neighbors' houses, and watch the poor person's house burn to the ground.
Show threadChristmas TreeSep 25, 2025
@Martin militaries operate at a loss too. I wonder how they would respond to that
Show threadEm & future cats 🇺🇦🐈🏳️‍🌈Sep 25, 2025
@christmastree @Martin 💯
Show threadPapa Exmatrikulatus 🏴🏳️‍🌈Sep 25, 2025
@Martin
I think you are right, but roads are maybe not the best example compared to the others.
The political right always wants more of them and we arguably have way to much or to wide roads already. ;)
Show thread❄️SnowyIn🇨🇦❄️Sep 25, 2025

@Martin

Edit: Before this announcement!👇

They lowered the delivery days to four in our rural area. So are the feds going to delay fines for late filing of taxes and will they increase tax credits/refunds for the reduced mail service?

Show threadKen ButlerSep 25, 2025
@Martin people seem to be very happy to have taxes pay for roads, but not other services.
Show threadCopernicronSep 25, 2025

@Martin Canada Post is absolutely vital to our country. There are large areas not covered by UPS, FedEx, etc specifically because they’re not profitable. Without Canada Post they would be completely cut off from the rest of the world in an essential way.

Incidentally, not needing to turn a profit is why I’m in favour of the federal government building the housing we need. Forget the overpriced “luxury” condos that artificially inflate prices. Just build solid homes for normal people.

Show threadKid ManiaSep 25, 2025

@copernicron @Martin

⬆️ 🇨🇦

Show threadCasper 👻Sep 25, 2025
@Martin
Maybe so, but the balls of the unions to claim how essential they are and deserve the pay they get does not allow them to more of my tax dollars. No one will notice much if door-to-door service is cut back and some offices are closed.
They are not ‘essential’ anymore.
Show threadEcolhombre ⏚ Sep 25, 2025
@Martin Same here in France 🙄
Show threadDan, the US is the threat!Sep 25, 2025
@Martin Parliement operates at a loss for that matter! 
Show threadLuka RubinjoniSep 25, 2025
@Martin Army, navy and airforce all operate at a major loss, yet somehow they rarely get mentioned in the "public services operating at a loss" discourse.
Show threadOntario Canuck 🇨🇦🏳️‍🌈Sep 25, 2025

@Martin

Well said!

Show threadDandelionSep 25, 2025
@Martin perhaps people who subscribe to the 'public services lose money' philosophy might take a hard look at parliamentary salaries...
Show threadMike LoukidesSep 25, 2025
@dashlion @Martin They might also look at what UPS or FedEx chargest to ship a letter.
Show threadCogito Ergo DisputoSep 25, 2025
@Martin amen
Show threadSuzy WongSep 25, 2025
@Martin Reducing the deficit is a key part of the debate. Changes like reduced delivery frequency and community mailboxes in urban areas are options to achieve this.
However, the main question is whether Canada Post should be run to make a profit. Its primary role is to be a public service. Recent losses aren't just from inefficiency; they're also due to the decline of traditional mail and the costs of modernizing the service.
The goal is to find a balance: make the service more efficient without compromising its social mission, especially for those who rely on it most.
Show threadAskPippa🇨🇦Sep 25, 2025
@Martin My question for people is: how often do you send letters by snail mail? A paper birthday card instead of an email greeting? Pay bills by cheque sent via post? Receive most if not all bills by post? Reduced use means something needs to change. Canada Post lost $1.3-billion just last year alone— a number that’s been increasing each year. That’s a lot of lost tax payer money. Not sure what the best changes should be, but it’s not really sustainable at this point.
Show threadMartin SettleSep 26, 2025
@AskPippa I'd never argue that there isn't room for altering systems and services to make it more efficient and sustainable (maybe even "appropriate", given the cultural and technological changes that have happened in the last 40 years). However, those kinds of transformations should not be premised on the idea that a universal postal/communications service should operate as profitable or even break-even
Show threadScary AustinSep 26, 2025

@Martin @AskPippa

Over in the US, the postal service is a lifeline for rural communities. People depend on it for their medications and other essentials. Just another way the regime is screwing its own voters, as well as the rural people who didn't vote for this.

I'm from the country myself. There would have been no service out there that anybody could *afford* without the public postal service. It's loss making to serve rural communities.

Show threadWombatDhampirSep 25, 2025
@Martin It's not the government's job to make money. It's job is to wisely spend money to provide things we all need to survive as a civilization.
Show threadTjb51Sep 26, 2025
@Martin Australia has gone down this path and it simply doesn't work.
Show threadAcroamatis 🇨🇦Sep 26, 2025
@Martin I feel like restoring postal banking and giving the Post Office the duty of handling a federal public/private key repository are just a couple of the services Canada Post could add to its roster to make up for a decline in lettermail.
Show threadGrant   🇨🇦Sep 26, 2025

@Martin Comparing Canada Post to civil services like health, education and such is a bit of a false equivalency. Most government services simply cannot exist as a profit centre. The terms ‘social service’ and ‘for profit’ simply do not intersect.

Canada Post is a hybrid. It provides a critical service to many Canadians who are not and will not served by private companies, but it also provides business services to companies. Maybe the social service aspect needs to be separated.

Show threadMartin SettleSep 26, 2025
@graand
Why separate the profitable services provided to corporations from the "unprofitable" essential service? Why can't a government function generate income to subsidize other functions?
Show threadGrant   🇨🇦Sep 26, 2025

@Martin Note I said “maybe”, it was not intended as a suggestion! I would prefer a single entity providing a mail service for businesses and residents but I don’t believe this is feasible while maintaining the current service model. The current cost of running Canada Post cannot be covered within the revenue envelope achieved within the significantly lower mail volumes.

This is not a simple problem to resolve. If CP is to continue the expense side simply has to fit with revenues.

Show threadSam IzbySep 26, 2025

@Martin

You, guys, voted for Justin Trudeau. Why are you still surprised?

Show threadJeffandthekidSep 26, 2025
@Martin Tuktoyaktuk knows!
Show threadJustin DerrickSep 27, 2025

@Martin I tried to have this conversation tonight, and asked how much money the local hospital loses.

They refused to answer, saying it was 'different'. The only difference they could come up with is that hospitals save lives -- true, but it doesn't change the fact that it's a service.

It turned immediately to "they make enough money already". When I asked why it's a problem that someone earns enough money to have a good life, they switched to statistics about how mail volumes have dropped.

When I asked how much it would cost to courier a letter across the country... They said we have eMail.

I asked about packages. Canada Post's rates for packages have gone up (and people complain about it a lot) but they're still very competitive compared to FedEx, UPS, Purolator, etc.

For the record, it looks like* the Federal and Provincial governments spent about $370 BILLION on healthcare in 2024. Canada Post costs $1.5B a year. Sounds like a deal.

  • It's hard to get good numbers of this, surprisingly.
Show threadKevin RussellSep 28, 2025

@Martin

And stop giving our stuff to billionaires.

!!

Hey Carney, its not just Trump invading, or even the United States, its BILLIONAIRES.

Show threadGlyphSep 28, 2025
@Martin @gvwilson bad news for anyone ideologically predisposed to characterize a service like the post office as operating “at a loss”: wait until you see the gross margins on having a military
Show threadDark Phoenix 🇺🇦🇨🇦🇬🇱🇵🇦🇵🇸🏳️‍🌈Sep 29, 2025
@Martin Americans who aren't
Brainwashed,
Braindead,
MAGAt cultists/Qanon
Nazis
Billionaires
Or
Psychopaths,
Totally agree with you.
Show threadJanisOct 3

@Martin Governments necessarily operate at a loss. The problem we're having is that the world oligarchs, and we really need to be thinking in those terms, are the only people to whom the governments (and Wall Street etc.) owe any substance to, while it's those same governments we're thinking will regulate those global oligarchs.... while here in the US, our last election was bought (enough of us sold out).

Billionaires didn't get to be that because they believe in a strong society.

Show threadJanisOct 3
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