The following figures primarily are for 1996. Coal companies and electric utilities, which burn the coal, paid almost 60 percent of all state business taxes. Coal miners' wages are almost double the average wage of other West Virginia workers. Coal mining creates a multitude of jobs in other industries such as power generation, steelmaking, and other machinery manufacturing. Big Coal gets what it wants in these counties, and that does not include diversifying the local economy.
Politicians are loathe to take actions which hold down or eliminate coal-mining jobs.
Regulators, subject to influence by elected officials, shift and waffle and delay to accomodate the wishes of public office holders. The state DEP caved in fast and issued its permit contingent upon the federal permit. EPA apparently was poised to accomodate the coal industry which knows how to make power plays. The third branch of government, the judiciary, stepped into the fray to decide the outcome. The pity is that mountaintop-removal advocates are doomed players in a drama greater than they are .