Betrayal of the Coal Miner

No, coal is not coming back.

Among President Trump’s many campaign promises was to bring coal back, claiming to increase jobs to miners who are unemployed. Experts disagree, and cite a number of reasons, not the least of which is that other forms – including natural gas, hydroelectricity, and solar – have replaced coal as a viable and sustainable source of energy.

This is nothing new. Alternative sources of energy have been outpacing coal for years now. While federal regulations aimed at improving public health increased the pace of decline, experts say that natural gas is largely to blame. Cheaper and cleaner than coal, natural gas has increased in market share, forcing out coal as the dominant source of energy in this country.

The entire coal industry employed around 53,000 in 2016 – 25,000 of which are directly related to the actual mining and processing of coal. The industry has seen a nearly 39 percent decline since its most recent peak in 2008. Coal makes up a very small percentage of total employment numbers in this country.

The problem with this empty promise is that the vast majority of coal mining jobs are isolated to small pockets of Wyoming, West Virginia and Kentucky, where some 585 million tons of coal are extracted and processed. This means that miners are concentrated in very small areas where it is just about the only game in town. This puts those who work in the mines in a very precarious position. Most employed in the mining industry come from generations of family members who also made a living that way. This small section of the labor force saw Trump as the hero of the coal miner. So far, his actions have been anything but heroic.

The main driver of the promise, however, is that Trump has friends in the coal industry. Coal magnates like Wilbur Ross, the current commerce secretary, have been tight with Trump for years. Ross was the owner of the Sago Mine at the time of the explosion in 2006, killing 12 miners. He is also indirectly responsible, along with other investors of a failing mine they purchased, for stripping the health benefits of miners – some of which had black lung disease. Trump, Ross, and other billionaires are no friends of the people. Their sole goal is to line their pockets without a thought to the people whose lives are destroyed in the process.

It could be that Trump and his supporters genuinely believe that coal mining can come back into favor. This is dangerously delusional and patently unrealistic, and the laughable and completely bogus campaign of “clean coal” is intended to bolster that belief.

The bottom line: Trump is selling a bill of goods. There is no possible way that coal can come back to employ all those who have suffered in the wake of the decline. But some organizations are trying to help the coal miners train for and find skilled work in other sectors. But, Trump is seeking to axe those programs, putting unemployed miners in greater jeopardy.