Waiting to Exhale

New federal rules could help coal miners breathe easier.

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


When Ernest Scott retired after 21 years as a coal miner in Virginia, his relaxation proved short-lived. Scott soon noticed that he was unable to climb stairs or walk short distances without becoming painfully short of breath. A doctor told him why: He had pneumoconiosis, more commonly known as black lung. Coal dust had scarred his lungs, preventing them from properly processing oxygen. Each year, according to the National Black Lung Association, 1,500 former miners die from complications related to the disease.

But Scott and thousands of other crippled miners have found it impossible to collect benefits under the Federal Black Lung Benefits Act, set up in 1969 to provide income to miners who suffer from the condition. When the program started, 75 percent of miners who filed claims were granted compensation. But over the years, coal companies backed rules that have enabled them to delay benefits. Since 1995, federal figures show, only 1,161 claims have been approved — fewer than 6 percent of the 19,377 claims filed.

“The cases usually last for years,” says Martin Wegbreit, an attorney for miners in Castlewood, Virginia. “Most folks don’t have the resources to fight that long.”

New federal rules introduced last year aim to streamline the claims process and award benefits to thousands of disabled miners. Under the proposed changes, officials deciding claims would consider equal amounts of evidence from miners and coal companies, and place more weight on testimony from a miner’s personal physician.

But coal companies have fought the reforms, calling them “an assault on profitability.” According to the industry, the number of miners awarded benefits will jump by 45 percent, putting many small operators out of business. “Coal operators and insurance companies are frustrated by the endless litigation by miners to get benefits,” says Ronald Gilbertson, who represents the industry.

In fact, some coal companies have fueled the number of claims by continuing to expose miners to dangerous levels of coal dust. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, nearly half of all mines have submitted false reports to conceal hazards. Federal officials announced last year that they would begin independently measuring dust levels for the first time.

“When it comes to coal dust sampling, almost everybody cheats — and everybody knows it,” says Senator Paul Wellstone, a Minnesota Democrat who has toured coal mines in eastern Kentucky. “This is more than a disgrace. It’s a tragedy.”

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We canā€™t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who wonā€™t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its futureā€”you.

And we need readers to show up for us big timeā€”again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We canā€™t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who wonā€™t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its futureā€”you.

And we need readers to show up for us big timeā€”again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate