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Canajun Finances Home » Random Thoughts: Postal Strikes

Random Thoughts: Postal Strikes

Do we really care?

There is a good chance that Canada Post will be on strike by the time you read this posting (here in Canada), and my only question is, does anyone care? Given the diminishing role that the Postal service is playing with E-mail, E-bills and independent courier companies, will a Postal strike matter? The simple answer is, yes it is going to matter for the folks who need the Postal system the most (folks who don’t have access to computers, and possibly lower income folks), so a Postal strike will hurt (some folks). It shouldn’t affect me too much, although I can’t seem to figure out how I will receive my water bill (from the City of Ottawa), but that is the only bill I have worries about.

This week also has had a few politicians both in Canada and the U.S. learning why you should be careful with any device that has a camera embedded in it, that can then send those pictures to the Internet. I have told my kids, that assume any picture taken is automatically posted on the web, and there is no such thing as discrete photos if they are on any device connected to the web. The days of discrete photos kept secret are long gone, but they do make for fun news stories as well.


I had a little fun wandering down memory lane (for my investing world), but we also heard that the Bank of Canada may be considering a change in their interest policies in the near future:

  • The video from our friends at Ted about Work Life Balance is actually an excellent talk which asks some very pointed but relevant questions about how you want to live your life.
  • I think I got the title wrong on Vegetarian Pet Owners, I should have titled it owners of Vegetarian pets, or something like that, but the Pet Industry is growing every day.
  • Why I am not Rich (Financially) covers the first part of my investing life and some of the opportunities I missed to make big money.
  • Low interest rates continue for now with Loose money Continues in May for Canada but the Bank of Canada is making broad hints that rates may be going up soon, but then again, I have been saying that for a while.
  • I wrap up my walk down memory lane with Why I am not Rich (the 90’s) where I outline some of the big misses and the big mistake I made during the heady days of the Great Internet Bubble.
  • Random Thoughts: Still Here is a recap of yet another week when the Rapture was due to happen, but didn’t.

I actually enjoy all comments (even the ones that question my sanity), and will try to respond to most comments, so please feel free to comment away. For you spammers who continue to inundate me with your drivel, keep it up as well.

Other Financial Bloggers had more insights about the RRSP season and the financial turmoil in the world these days:

Carnivals this Week

I also had some submissions accepted to various carnivals, so go have a read of these as well:

Remember

“The way I understand it, the Russians are sort of a combination of evil and incompetence… sort of like the Post Office with tanks.”

Author: Emo Phillips

Feel Free to Comment

  1. We’ve got an issue here in Australia where QANTAS staff are going on strike even though the companies is declining in profitability every year. I think it does little by to lessen the publics opinion of unions

  2. nancy (aka moneycoach)

    I’ll care if they go on strike: I am a member of zip.ca, an awesome little company that mails me dvd’s. Up here in Yellowknife there’s not a whole lot of selection, and there are a whole lot of dark, winter nights so I’ve totally appreciated zip.ca. Granted presumably the strike will be over by the time darkness falls again, but still, I don’t want that business to get hurt.
    Congrats on the mention on Gail’s blog! That’s huge!

  3. Re: Canada Post

    Care? me? Nah!

    Privatize Canada Post. Fire the employees and let them eat crow! $30/hour to read an address and put it in a megabox? Are you kidding? They finish their workday at 10 AM.

    Did you know they have the best drug plan this side of the universe? Yeah. It even covers Viagra! We wouldn’t want our posties to be frustrated in THAT departement now, would we?

  4. Canadian Capitalist

    Thanks for the mention! I think I’ll be in a wait and watch mode on these covered call ETFs as well.

  5. Thanks for the mention!

    The City of Lethbridge has promised to hand deliver all utility bills if neccessary. No mention of hand delivering cheques though, strangely enough.

    I thought it was pretty funny that Senator Wiener was going to launch a full investigation into whether or not that was his junk in that photo.

    1. If there was a picture of my “package” on the web I think I’d be able to recognize it (unless someone photoshopped it, if you know what I mean).

  6. The postal strike has me thinking about signing up for more online bill deliveries and anything else I can do to minimize my use of paper mail. Thanks for the mention.

  7. Weii I sure care about the Post Office going on stike.
    My business has two divisions, one involves a contract with the Goverment, which pays by cheque (they refuse to usedirect deposit) and the other division is a mail order lure business. There is no alternative to mail for a small item mail order businesses (I guess the name says it all).
    I can’t possibly be the only Canadian that uses the postal service.

    1. True, and Amazon uses them too as their Canadian Courier, so we shall see what this all means. I don’t see any picket lines up and my office is across the road from a Postal Office.

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