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The US coal industry has been investing in automation and shedding workers for ages. The American coal industry's all time record year for output tonnage was 20
by philipkglass 10y ago
The US coal industry has been investing in automation and shedding workers for ages. The American coal industry's all time record year for output tonnage was 2008, and accomplished it with about half of the workers employed in 1980. The American coal industry shed a larger number of workers (though admittedly not a larger percentage of workers) during the Reagan administration than during the Obama administration. It didn't start with Reagan either. It's been going on pretty much continuously for as long as we have records. American coal employment was lower and tonnage output was higher in the 1950s than the 1920s also.
- porsupah 10y agoIndeed - the Center for Media and Democracy's wiki article on US coal mining has some interesting charts: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Coal_and_jobs_in_the_United_States#Coal_mining_jobs http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Coal_and_jobs_in_the_Un... Starting in 1900, with 448,581 miners producing 268,684,000 short tons, the output's more or less risen steadily to almost four times that total amount, but the number employed in 2013 was 80,209, reflecting about 20x the productivity of 1900. As far as the point of employment goes, Wyoming claimed a relatively modest total of 6,673 mining (surface and underground) jobs in 2013.