Miners Get Shafted

Clean coal is an oxymoron

   Coal is, by its nature, a dirty fuel. And just as many folks remember ice skating as local ponds froze over, these same folks can remember growing up in homes heated by coal furnaces. Others can remember, as young men at military basic training camps, living in barracks heated by coal furnaces, sometimes poorly attended by fellow soldiers, and waking up covered with coal dust.
   But the local firms that delivered coal to homes have either gone out of business or now pump oil to fuel renovated furnaces.
   And on the same day that President Trump announced that the U.S. is leaving the Paris climate accord, three coal-fired power plants -- two in New Jersey and one in Massachusetts -- reported they will be shut down. The Los Angeles Times quoted Jeff Tittel, director of the environmentalist New Jersey Sierra Club, as saying that "no matter what the president does, the country is moving towards cleaner sources of energy."
   In addition, home owners have switched to gas heat or electric heat generated by hydroelectric plants or by solar power. In fact, entire cities have worked hard to cut back on the use of coal because of the dangers caused by coal emissions that generated often-fatal smog, including London and San Francisco.
   So why all the fuss about bringing coal back as a major contributor to job growth and the national economy?
   One answer could be that coal mine owners are major donors to and financial supporters of political campaigns. An estimated 97 percent of coal industry contributions last year went to Republicans, according to Nobel economist Paul Krugman, writing in the New York Times.
   As for the miners, those who actually do the dangerous work of digging out the coal, breathing coal dust and risking black lung disease (will that be covered by Trumpcare?) as well as accidents like being trapped when tunnels collapse, they continue to be shafted by mine owners who fail to provide safe working conditions and adequate health benefits when they do get sick from coal-related diseases.
   Despite the president's claim that he will bring back jobs for coal miners, the reality is that there were only about 76,000 coal industry jobs remaining in America in 2014, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Since then, that number has shrunk to 50,300 as of February 2017, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And many of them are not miners, but others working in administrative jobs.
   So who hires more workers than mine owners? Government statistics show that individual companies employ more. Walmart, for example, has 2.2 million employees, nearly 30 times the number of people working in the coal industry. And J.C. Penney, another retail chain, has 114,000 employees.
   Moreover, coal industry experts agree that these jobs are not coming back. Even a museum in West Virginia dedicated to the coal industry and its history, has switched to other energy sources.
   Technology and alternate sources that supply more efficient, less expensive, cleaner, healthier, and safer power to more people, have joined to bring major changes to the energy industry.
   The danger to health is clear. Not only dangerous to the miners, but also to the nation and the world because of pollution generated by the burning of coal. And as alternate energy becomes more available at less cost, many are switching. The U.S. began changing over years ago. And now, less developed nations are switching, including India and China,
   The economic bottom line is this: The future of job creation in America will be in technology and service industries, along with related businesses that support the major companies.
   Manufacturing will still be there, but those jobs will require more skills than ever before.