May 23, 2013
The U.S. postal service is losing money and the situation is growing more serious by the day.
If congress doesn't act by August 1st, the service will default on a 5.5 billion dollar payment to the federal government to cover retiree health benefits.
It would be the first default in its more than 200 year history.
Losses from a sluggish economy and the growing number of people paying their bills online, have forced the service to tap a nearly13 billion dollar treasury department loan to make ends meet.
The service has a plan to cut costs by 22.5 billion dollars by 2016 and return the service to profitability.
