The Postal Service’s costs workplace injury and illness benefits have been three-tenths to four-tenths higher than benchmark private sector companies over the last five years but it would take a change in law for the USPS to take the same types of cost-saving steps those companies have taken, an inspector general report has said.
It said that in 2022 for example, postal employees accounted for about 40 percent of the nearly $3 billion in benefit payments across the federal government under the Federal Employees Compensation Act, as well as about the same share of new claims in that year. Of the total spending under FECA, it added, more than $2 billion is for wage loss compensation, about $700 million for medical and rehabilitation services and the rest for death benefits to survivors.