5 ms·

No one's really arguing for coal, truly. They're arguing for jobs, respect, and a livelihood. I've got a lot of family from southern Appalachia (N GA to WV).

• jbattle 8y ago
  There are only 50k coal miners in the USA. I'm not at all against generous job retraining programs, but why does the rest of the country/world need to be held off any progress on this issue for the sake of a relatively small group? There are individual companies that have more employees. After 9/11 the airline industry lost something like 40,000 jobs. We didn't resurrect the WPA then. What makes coal special?
  • AnimalMuppet 8y ago
    The airline industry is scattered all over the country. If you lose your airline job in, say, Chicago, there are a lot of other jobs in Chicago. But coal is the backbone of a big chunk of Appalachia. If you lose your coal job in Welch, West Virginia, there's nothing else. And if there are a few other jobs, the number of laid-off coal-related people absolutely swamps the openings.
    • empath75 8y ago
      So move people away, bulldoze the towns and let it return to nature.
      • deleted 8y ago
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    • jbattle 8y ago
      Honestly, I'd love if our society chose to be more generous and invest in retraining workers across the board. But if someone loses their job in Welch, West Virginia, and there's nothing else ... they might need to move. How is it different from steel jobs drying up in Gary IN? Or automobile jobs in Detroit? Or fishing jobs in Maine? Or tobacco jobs in ... wherever tobacco was grown
      • deleted 8y ago
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      • ethbro 8y ago
        > tobacco The Carolinas and Virginia, I think. And you're right, it's not that different. The only thing I'd say is that I believe steel jobs were a bit slower of a transition. I believe most of the slide took place in the 60s - 80s as lower cost Japanese steel took off? Tobacco is also somewhat replaceable. If you were planting it, you can plant other things. So the glide path is a bit easier.
        • philipkglass 8y ago
          Most of the lost coal mining jobs were also lost in decades past: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES1021210001 https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES1021210001 Set the "from" date back to 1985 (earliest year available in this UI). There were 170,500 American coal mining jobs in January 1985. When Obama entered office in January 2009, there were 86,400.
          • ethbro 8y ago
            Point. So I guess the jobs left are the last of the industry. The irony is that production of coal seems to have increased (see top graph; https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_mining_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_mining_in_the_United_St... ) since 1970. Goes to show the power of political narrative vs a reality of automation. But I suppose even for the companies it's a lot easier to blame Washington than tell people you bought a $250,000 machine to replace them.
  • subway 8y ago
    I think a big part of it is that airline industry is typically co-located in cities with large numbers of other jobs, allowing a region to soak up the loss a little more easily. In coal dependent regions, the mining jobs create downstream jobs in transportation and general support of mining towns. This means when a mine shuts down, along with it go other local jobs, from gas station attendants to truck drivers and freight train conductors.
    • bradknowles 8y ago
      There's already a major shortage of truck drivers in this country. Maybe not where the mines are, but elsewhere. But if they're truck drivers, then they should be able to drive trucks elsewhere, for other industries. So, at least that part of the downstream economy shouldn't be a factor. Unless, that is, they insist on continuing to be truck drivers for coal mines, and living in the same place that they have always lived. But if they're going to be intransigent, then I don't have a lot of sympathy for them. Please note, my uncle is a truck driver, and I've heard a lot about the industry from his personal experience. I do actually have a lot of sympathy for truck drivers in general. But this is a transportation industry, and they have to go where the jobs are.
      • subway 8y ago
        Sure -- in theory all the regional jobs should be transferable to another region. That doesn't make it any less painful when a region's primary economic resource closes shop without a replacement. The absolute best case scenario, where everyone finds a happy new position elsewhere still results in a dead town filled with blighted property.
  • wtallis 8y ago
    I think the biggest problem with the political issues surrounding coal is that it's so iconic an industry in the areas it operates. That makes it all too easy to overestimate the size and importance of the industry. In reality, it's been dwindling for a long time, though its complete death is by no means imminent.
    • ethbro 8y ago
      And it's difficult (not unlike with the armed forces) to untangle respect with support for expansion. I respect the hell out of anyone who mines coal for a living. It's gotten safer, but it's still a tough job that I'm glad I don't have to do. I absolutely oppose anything that expands the coal industry. So how do I square those? Personally, I feel like we as a country owe the folks who did that work maybe a bit more than we would others. And if that happens to also be a more a practical approach to transitioning our economy off a toxic energy source? So much the better.
  • xapata 8y ago
    > What makes coal special? The coal industry is a larger portion of the economic activity of the states it's in. The airline industry is diffused across the country. Helping the coal industry is kind-of like gerrymandering.
  • smogcutter 8y ago
    > What makes coal special? Coal workers are important because the suburban whites who make up the GOP's voting base identify with them.
  • yborg 8y ago
    How many hedge fund managers are there in the US? And yet they have a special provision in the tax code that they pay a maximum income tax rate of 15%. You could just cut a $200K check to every single coal miner and cost half what the carried interest loophole costs the US Treasury - every year.
  • FooHentai 8y ago
    >but why does the rest of the country/world need to be held off any progress on this issue for the sake of a relatively small group? That seems to miss the parent poster's main point, which was proposing a way of making progress on this issue.
  • ZeroGravitas 8y ago
    Coal is "special" because the economic benefits can be funneled narrowly and that allows oligarchs to get rich and pay off the government so they get richer. One such oligarch was just revealed to have written 6 of Trumps excecutive actions on coal energy.
  • Spooky23 8y ago
    It’s a misleading statistic. Probably 500k more workers are employed in railroads, power plants, trucking companies, schools, etc. All dependent on coal. Using those numbers is like saying that only data center support workers work in tech. Every pair of hands at AWS probably supports 1000x people downstream.
• pm90 8y ago
  Why? There have been warnings, economic indicators for years that coal was not sustainable. That coal based jobs would be destroyed. These folks had ample time to adjust their lifestyle, to retrain for new industries and such. Instead, not only did they not take proactive steps to remedy their situation, they fell for a hucksters false promises and voted for him. Why should I respect these people?
  • zaphar 8y ago
    There are likely just as many structural reasons that people in coal country are still there as there are reasons for people in like income city neighborhoods to be stuck there. You are vastly oversimplifying both their responsibility and yours for the situation they are in.
• adamwong246 8y ago
  What have these people done to deserve such treatment? Have they made strides to further their education? Have they embraced modernity? And where has that "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" mentality gone? As far as I can tell, the coal industry a small, whiny, retrograde minority that refuse to engage with reality. They done nothing for me except ruin my future from the other side of the continent.
  • AnimalMuppet 8y ago
    > Have they embraced modernity? Wow. Sounds like you ought to embrace modernity, specifically the part about tolerance for others who are different from you. As for the substance of your question: They vote. We're talking several states' worth of voters, who will turn against anybody who advocates your position as a political platform. So, politically, if you want to kill coal, you have to not dead-end these people, no matter what you think of them personally.
    • adamwong246 8y ago
      I'm sorry but this election has taught me the limits to my own tolerance. My patience for "The Reds" is exhausted. As someone who grew up in these places, I can tell you without hesitation: These people won't change. They despise change. They don't want new jobs, any more than they want healthcare. What they want is endless adoration and rose-tinted nostalgia. The coal industry is a racehorse with a broken leg and it should be treated as such. And if coal miners can't figure that out, they shouldn't be accommodated.
    • mikeash 8y ago
      Why should I have tolerance for someone who thinks their need to keep an obsolete job is more important than my need to not die?
      • AnimalMuppet 8y ago
        Those who lose those obsolete jobs have a higher probability of dying than you do. The stress literally kills people, even if they don't commit suicide or wind up addicted to opioids.
• ecopoesis 8y ago
  Why? There are ~76,000[1] coal worker in the US out of 151 million people in the workforce[2]. Why does this minuscule industry deserve more protections then say Toys 'R' Us' 31,000 employees?[3] Just because they all vote GOP? Coal is a terrible industry that is destroying the world. It can't go away quick enough. [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/03/31/8-surprisingly-small-industries-that-employ-more-people-than-coal/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.e2138c5d7c31 https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/03/31/8-sur... [2] https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12000000 https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12000000 [3] http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/16/news/companies/toys-r-us-employees/index.html http://money.cnn.com/2018/03/16/news/companies/toys-r-us-emp...
• chris_va 8y ago
  Devil's advocate question, why? We are talking about an ~200,000 person industry, why does the federal government need to go take care of each small industry that gets out-competed? I could see having a generic program in place for retraining, which does exist [1]. But it's not like journalism, say, which could arguably have an out-sided improvement for the rest of the country above and beyond its business model and is worth saving for its own sake. Coal is highly polluting and prematurely kills ~10,000 people/year in this country [2]. It seems like a rational government should regulate against it, if anything. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-trump-effect-coal-retraining-insight/awaiting-trumps-coal-comeback-miners-reject-retraining-idUSKBN1D14G0 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-trump-effect-coal-retrain... [2] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-other-reason-to-shift-away-from-coal-air-pollution-that-kills-thousands-every-year/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-other-reason-...
  • ethbro 8y ago
    They're fair questions. 1, Realpolitk) Because our democracy gives states power outsized to their population through the Senate, and because there are several purple states along the coal belt. Consequently, their voters (many of whom are miners or employed because of downstream mine revenue) possess to the political power to force people to listen to them. 2, Moral) In 2014, per capita income for the region was $37k, or about 80% of US. Poverty was 19.7% vs 15.6% for the US [1]. From personal experience, there are still places that feel like 1950. (Also, per capita, the area has been and is disproportionately over-represented in our armed forces) 3, Economically Practical) As others noted, there isn't exactly a humming engine of economic diversity in the region. Heavy industry and mining is vastly overrepresented, which generally means if "the plant" closes the town dies. 4, Cultural) From music to speech to food, there's a distinct culture there. So moving "elsewhere" isn't just a geographic change, but more akin to uprooting thousands of people from New Orleans and dropping them in other cities. As another commenter suggested, "Why not just move people away?" Honestly, I'd be fine with this, if it were done humanely. But screwing people isn't going to win votes (or feel particularly morally righteous). And short of that, we aren't going to get the environmental change we need. Hell, we could have probably transitioned the entire region off coal for a fraction of the budget we spent on the Iraq War. [1] https://fahe.org/appalachian-poverty/ https://fahe.org/appalachian-poverty/
• suresk 8y ago
  What is so special about coal miners? Tons of other industries have undergone or will be soon bigger shifts in unemployment. Retail workers have been hit hard by online shopping. Taxi drivers have been hit by Uber and Lyft and the like. Truck drivers will be hit by self-driving trucks. Factory and warehouse workers have been hit by automation, which will only continue. I don't feel like we "owe" coal miners anything more than we owe other people who are industries facing declines. That said, I agree with most of what you are saying - technological innovation and other changes are hitting certain groups of people fairly hard and we, as a society, need to do more to help them transition to other careers.
  • creaghpatr 8y ago
    I'm surprised they don't pack up and head to Midland Texas where they can't hand out high paying contract jobs fast enough. https://www.marketwatch.com/story/looking-for-a-job-these-cities-are-hiring-2018-06-01 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/looking-for-a-job-these-ci...
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• tomjen3 8y ago
  I happen to be in favour of a model based on WPA to tackle unemployment in general, but coal doesn't have any special claims and should not be afforded any. I am aware that is essentially dooming West Virginia, but people will then simply have to move. No that is not easy. But if we allow one particular group to claim special rights, then all other groups will have similar requirements and we will end up in a situation where we will never be able to advance the state of the country, or the world. If we had chosen the "Luddite solution" back in the day, then instead of being obese we would have been starving. Essentially nobody would have learned to read or write, and we would have been happy to have two sets of clothes. No special rights were due then, no special rights are due today.
• bradknowles 8y ago
  If you want WPA/TVA type jobs to replace the coal mining jobs that no longer exist, then the people have to be willing to go where the construction work is to be done. We can't just guarantee that they'll get WPA/TVA jobs to do all the construction in the country, without having them be willing and able to move to where the work is. Moreover, construction is a young persons job. Older people can't work those kinds of jobs, at least not with the same level of efficiency and willingness to kill yourself (sometimes literally). So approximately zero point zero percent of those miners would be able to actually do those construction jobs, even if they were willing to do so and willing to move close to where the work is.
  • ethbro 8y ago
    Is mining that different in terms of physical requirements to construction? I'll admit I'm not intimately familiar with modern coal mining. But from the people I know in the industry (even older) vs who seems to be employable by our state DOT, I'd daresay the number should be a lot higher than ~0.0%.
    • stevenwoo 8y ago
      Modern coal mining has transitioned to mostly automated mountain top removal instead of the digging mines into the ground we might be more familiar with from film/tv, that's part of the reason the number of jobs has been shrinking combined with of course the switch to natural gas and renewables for power generation. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/11/04/heres-why-central-appalachias-coal-industry-is-dying/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/11/04/heres...
• jpao79 8y ago
  I found this PBS Newshour report that was inspiring: Job training and community college put coal miners on a new path https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/job-training-community-college-put-coal-miners-new-path https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/job-training-community-col... The question is, is it to optimistic? As someone who has never been to the region first hand, I'd be curious if it is too idealized.
  • ethbro 8y ago
    Warning: this one will pull your heartstrings and is pretty slickly produced, but it's also not inaccurate. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bVkCDZ4RUIg# https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bVkCDZ4RUIg# It's a difficult problem, people being who they are. Certainly, there's less public education in the area, but people are difficult to move to new things anyway. For all the "Well, they should just change" opinions, I try and ask myself what I'd do if (constructed hypothetical) tomorrow it turned out that running computers caused cancer. Honestly, the reason I'm here instead of living a different life was my grandfather lying his way into the Navy at 17 during WWII, taking advantage of the GI Bill, and getting through graduate school. Sans that, I'd have been born up in the hills of east Tennessee, and probably never have seen a computer as a child.
• jernfrost 8y ago
  I think the US has ended up with right wing populism like Trumpism because there is no social democratic alternative available in the US. We've gone through all the same de-industrialization in my native Norway as the US has. I come from a blue collar industrial town in Norway which used to produce paper, glass, ships, raincoats/workwear, pots, pans, insulation etc. It felt like every few years as I grew up another venerable old factory closed down for good. Except people in my town never went through the kind of hardship I see the American working class go through because we had already built up extensive institutions to deal with it. We spend something like 10x as much per capita on job retraining for unemployed people. If they can't get new industry going and retraining people for those industries, they use other means like moving government functions to the towns that have been hardest hit. Keeping unemployment low is a very high priority in Norway, in no small part due to the labour party (social democrats) having "work for everybody" as their slogan since the 30s. I got an American wife, and I really cheered for Bernie Sanders. I had so hoped he could have brought many of the things we have been able to enjoy for decades here in Norway to Americans. Unfortunately he lost, but I think there was movement in the electorate and openness to new ideas like I've never seen before. I had never thought you could get that many votes in the US saying anything positive about socialism.
• tzs 8y ago
  > If coal sunsets, America needs to make a promise that we're going to do right by miners. In a bigger, more sustained way than recent token retraining efforts. Something on WPA / TVA scale. One of the major 2016 Presidential candidates had a plan to help them [1]. The miners overwhelmingly voted for the other candidate. [1] http://static.politico.com/b8/90/cbbc9c59413089d87e8d6340f13d/clinton-releases-30-billion-strategy-to-help-coal-communities.pdf http://static.politico.com/b8/90/cbbc9c59413089d87e8d6340f13...