Last week the Postmaster General told a Senate committee that the USPS was in “in the midst of a financial disaster”, and about to run out of money to fund its operations.
So it’s just slightly surprising to discover that, as the Federal Times revealed today, the USPS is paying a celebrity “futurist” $1.5 million to, among other things, “divine” the future of stamps. The self-proclaimed “futurist” in question is a woman who calls herself “Faith Popcorn”, and who became marginally famous twenty years ago for predicting that something she called “cocooning” was the Next Big Thing.
It wasn’t.
But that hasn’t stopped Ms. “Popcorn”! She may not be much of a fortune teller, but she can certainly market herself: Faith earns makes a cool $836 an hour to do her magic! Divination does not come cheap these days!
After starting the assignment early last month, BrainReserve– whose website touts its consulting specialty as “applied futurism”–is supposed to finish up work by mid-October, the statement indicates. Faith Popcorn, the company’s CEO, is billing the Postal Service at an hourly rate of $836. Labor fees for other BrainReserve staff involved in the project range from $91 to $334 per hour.
According to documents obtained by the Federal Times, Ms. Popcorn’s company has a contract for over a half million dollars to tell the future of stamps, and another worth $1.1 million to “explore the possibility of using letter carriers to provide paid home visitation services to the elderly and ill.”