[Submitted] Black Lungs, Black Heart

[Verdant Haven]

Motivated by the news regarding legendarily horrible person and former mine operator Bob Murray claiming to have Black Lung (protections against which he fought fiercely for years), realizing it doesn't look like we have an issue on the subject of Black Lung, and living not terribly far from the part of the US where this very problem is an extremely hot-button issue... here's an issue on Black Lung (and by extension, other industrial diseases related to mining).

2nd Draft

[TITLE]
Black Lungs, Black Heart

[DESCRIPTION]
The mines of @@NAME@@ have proven a boon to the economy, providing a rich supply of resources to fuel business and trade. Unfortunately, they have also provided a bumper crop of illnesses amongst miners, with hospitals reporting record numbers of patients suffering from Coal Workers' Pneumoconiosis in particular, better known as Black Lung.

[VALIDITY]
Nations with a high "Industry: Mining" score

[CHOICE 1]
"This nation must do a better job protecting workers from on the job hazards" concludes industrial hygienist @@RANDOMNAME@@, while showing you around a local hospital. "You should establish a Miners' Health Commission to institute standards for exposure to dangerous materials, and to mandate appropriate protections for our miners! Any operator that doesn't follow the rules should be looking at a hefty fine, to be put towards compensating the families of injured miners."
[EFFECT 1]
the cost of fines is just another line item on the ledgers of successful mines

[CHOICE 2]
"It's a bit late for me, isn't it?" wheezes coal miner @@RANDOMMALENAME@@ from his hospital bed. "My daddy died of Black Lung, and his daddy before him, and soon I'll be joining them. Meanwhile those fat cats at the top look on with their caviar and bubbly, totally consequence free! Fines are well and good, but what happened was criminal negligence, or worse! You must bring criminal charges against those murderers, and send the management of unsafe workplaces to prison!"
[EFFECT 2]
every workplace accident involves a full-scale criminal investigation

[CHOICE 3]
"Nonsense!" wheezes mine operator @@RANDOMMALEFIRSTNAME@@ Murray, breathing deeply from the portable oxygen tank at his side. "I spent my youth down in the mines too, and I'm just fine! I'm not giving one single @@CURRENCY@@ to these lay-abouts who just want to sit there crying. They want their families to get paid? Tell their families to get in the mines! Anybody who can swing a pick should be helping the nation, not begging for hand-outs."
[EFFECT 3]
headlamps and hard hats are popular coming-of-age gifts

[CHOICE 4]
"If you'll excuse me for interrupting, @@LEADER@@, I'm afraid none of these solutions addresses the problem" interjects youthful doctor @@RANDOMNAME@@, as your tour is wrapping up. "So long as we're sending people into the mines, we're going to have people afflicted with awful diseases. What @@NAME@@ needs is a whole new energy sector! Establish a huge green energy program, and offer to re-train the miners in newer, safer technology. It will take time to get going, but we can 'mine' our power needs right from the sun!"
[EFFECT 4]
former miners are finally getting their time in the sun

1st Draft

Motivated by the news today regarding legendarily horrible person and former mine operator Bob Murray claiming to have Black Lung (protections against which he fought fiercely for years), realizing it doesn't look like we have an issue on the subject of Black Lung, and living not terribly far from the part of the US where this very problem is an extremely hot-button issue... here's the beginnings of an issue on Black Lung (and by extension, other industrial diseases related to mining).

[TITLE]
Black Lungs, Black Heart

[DESCRIPTION]
The mines of @@NAME@@ have proven a boon to the economy, providing a rich supply of resources to fuel business and trade. Unfortunately, they have also provided a bumper crop of illnesses amongst miners, with hospitals reporting record numbers of patients suffering from Coal Worker's Pneumoconiosis in particular, better known as Black Lung.

[VALIDITY]
Nations with a high "Industry: Mining" score

[CHOICE 1] (mine safety regulations)
"This nation must do a better job protecting workers from on the job hazards" concludes industrial hygienist @@RANDOMNAME@@, while showing you around a local hospital. "You should establish a Miners' Health Commission to institute standards for exposure to dangerous materials, and to mandate appropriate protections for our miners! Any operator that doesn't follow the rules should be looking at a hefty fine, and maybe even revocation of their mining rights.

[EFFECT 1]
the cost of fines is just another line item on the ledgers of successful mines

[CHOICE 2] (regulations PLUS compensation fund for victims, criminal charges for operators)
"It's a bit late for me, isn't it?" wheezes coal miner @@RANDOMMALENAME@@ from his hospital bed. "My daddy died of Black Lung, and his daddy before him, and soon I'll be joining them. What about my family? Set up your commission, but you also need to make these operators pay for our medical bills, and pensions for our families when we're gone! And fines aren't gonna stop anybody… if mines are making people sick, send the management to prison!"

[EFFECT 2]
most of the nation's mining output goes to pay the medical bills of those who produced it

[CHOICE 3] (No regulations, threat of lawsuit)
"Nonsense!" roars mine operator @@RANDOMMALEFIRSTNAME@@ Murray, yanking the curtain closed around the miner's bed. "I spent my youth down in the mines too, and I'm just fine! I'm not taking responsibility for these lay-abouts, nor will I pay them one single @@CURRENCY@@ for this time spent on their backs crying. They want their family to get paid? Tell their families to get in the mines! Anybody who can swing a pick should be helping the nation, not begging for hand-outs."

[EFFECT 3]
headlamps and hard hats are popular coming-of-age gifts

[CHOICE 4] (remove industry, re-train and re-employ)
"If you'll excuse me for interrupting, @@LEADER@@, I'm afraid none of these solutions will really address the problem" interjects youthful doctor @@RANDOMNAME@@, as your tour is wrapping up. "So long as we're sending people into the mines, we're going to have people coming back afflicted with awful industrial diseases. What @@NAME@@ needs is a major program of re-training, to enable miners to move into safer industries… like Information Technology! Then we can close the mines, and move our economy into the future!"

[EFFECT 4]
sore wrists have replaced sore backs as miners have gone digital

[USS Monitor]

Black lung should probably get more national attention in the US. Interesting subject.

I think it would be nice if option 4 addressed what you are going to do for fuel once you close the mines. Are you importing coal, so you just pass the problem on to some other country? Are you investing in other sources of energy so you don't need coal anymore? Maybe instead of closing the mines, you could have remote-controlled mining robots?

[Trotterdam]

legendarily horrible person and former mine operator Bob Murray

Huh. Doesn't seem to be any of the 34 people currently on this list. Got a news article?

[CHOICE 1] (mine safety regulations)
"This nation must do a better job protecting workers from on the job hazards" concludes industrial hygienist @@RANDOMNAME@@, while showing you around a local hospital. "You should establish a Miners' Health Commission to institute standards for exposure to dangerous materials, and to mandate appropriate protections for our miners! Any operator that doesn't follow the rules should be looking at a hefty fine, and maybe even revocation of their mining rights.

[EFFECT 1]
the cost of fines is just another line item on the ledgers of successful mines

[CHOICE 2] (regulations PLUS compensation fund for victims, criminal charges for operators)
"It's a bit late for me, isn't it?" wheezes coal miner @@RANDOMMALENAME@@ from his hospital bed. "My daddy died of Black Lung, and his daddy before him, and soon I'll be joining them. What about my family? Set up your commission, but you also need to make these operators pay for our medical bills, and pensions for our families when we're gone! And fines aren't gonna stop anybody… if mines are making people sick, send the management to prison!"

[EFFECT 2]
most of the nation's mining output goes to pay the medical bills of those who produced it

I'm not sure we need both options. What motivation would someone have to choose option 1, other than not having read the difference between options 1 and 2 closely enough?

Also, any sensible person would combine the fines and the compensation fund. It doesn't make much sense to pay the compensation from taxpayers' money rather than punishing the companies responsible. It also doesn't deter anyone to pocket a small fine that's worth much less than the actual damage done.

[CHOICE 4] (remove industry, re-train and re-employ)
"If you'll excuse me for interrupting, @@LEADER@@, I'm afraid none of these solutions will really address the problem" interjects youthful doctor @@RANDOMNAME@@, as your tour is wrapping up. "So long as we're sending people into the mines, we're going to have people coming back afflicted with awful industrial diseases. What @@NAME@@ needs is a major program of re-training, to enable miners to move into safer industries… like Information Technology! Then we can close the mines, and move our economy into the future!"

[EFFECT 4]
sore wrists have replaced sore backs as miners have gone digital[/box]

The biggest problem with suddenly doing away with your coal mining industry isn't how to retrain your workers, it's where you're getting your coal from. You'll need to either import your coal from other nations (which might not have any better worker safety standards), or rework your industrial infrastructure to use power sources other than coal. ...Or USS Monitor's suggestion of mining robots.

[Honeydewistania]

legendarily horrible person and former mine operator Bob Murray

Huh. Doesn't seem to be any of the 34 people currently on this list. Got a news article?

Look at the one directly under the ‘Others’ section.

[Trotterdam]

Look at the one directly under the ‘Others’ section.

Okay, so here's the article.

Additionally, he disputed that he ever fought against regulations to quell the disease or fought miners from receiving benefits.

Murray also threatened to file a lawsuit if a story was published that indicated he had fought federal regulations and benefits.

...Wow.

Perhaps show the speaker for option 3 coughing a little to hint that he might not be entirely truthful?

[Verdant Haven]

Black lung should probably get more national attention in the US. Interesting subject.

I think it would be nice if option 4 addressed what you are going to do for fuel once you close the mines. Are you importing coal, so you just pass the problem on to some other country? Are you investing in other sources of energy so you don't need coal anymore? Maybe instead of closing the mines, you could have remote-controlled mining robots?

It is a major public health crisis in mining regions, to be sure!

Your feedback is something so obvious, I can't believe I missed it. Thank you! I was focusing on the attempts at running re-training programs in places like West Virginia, to give coal miners skills in others areas, but I didn't reflect on the fact that the training they were being offered was in green energy technology, in order to respond to exactly the problem you're pointing out! I will edit accordingly.

Huh. Doesn't seem to be any of the 34 people currently on this list. Got a news article?

Here's the direct Wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_E._Murray

For a good dive in to his awfulness, John Oliver has done multiple episodes with him as a significant focus point - one covering his coal mining related activities specifically, and another one after Murray sued them claiming defamation for the first episode (the lawsuit being thrown out, with prejudice), covering SLAPP suits and Murray's constant use of them to try and intimidate and silence anybody who points out his activities. The lawsuits and threats thereof continue... having spent years campaigning against black lung protections for miners, and now attempting to claim black lung benefits for himself, he threatened to sue any journalist who mentions that he ever campaigned against those protections.

Here's the latest: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/coal-ceo-robert-murray-files-black-lung-benefits-73369580

I'm not sure we need both options. What motivation would someone have to choose option 1, other than not having read the difference between options 1 and 2 closely enough?

Also, any sensible person would combine the fines and the compensation fund. It doesn't make much sense to pay the compensation from taxpayers' money rather than punishing the companies responsible. It also doesn't deter anyone to pocket a small fine that's worth much less than the actual damage done.

The difference I'm going for is basically option 1 being "henceforward we're going to pay attention to this" and option 2 being "What they've done was negligent and we need to punish them retroactively for everything up to this point as well."

I can see where that didn't come through clearly - word count is a pain! I'll try to make these more distinctive.

Unfortunately, regulatory fines that cost less than the profit made from violating a policy are incredibly standard practice. Banking and airlines are two examples of industries that just consider fines for violations to be a cost of doing business, because they make far more money paying the fine and ignoring the regulation than by following the rules.

The biggest problem with suddenly doing away with your coal mining industry isn't how to retrain your workers, it's where you're getting your coal from. You'll need to either import your coal from other nations (which might not have any better worker safety standards), or rework your industrial infrastructure to use power sources other than coal. ...Or USS Monitor's suggestion of mining robots.

Yeah... big facepalm from me for overlooking that concern. I'll be doing some overhaul to have an alternative included here! I must have been more tired than I realized when I drafted - I also just noticed that I left the parenthetical tags after the Choice numbers describing my basic concept of the option, which is not meant to be posted. That's just part of my initial outlining process and I typically delete it before Draft 1 goes up!

]...Wow.

Perhaps show the speaker for option 3 coughing a little to hint that he might not be entirely truthful?

In my original (unposted) drafting, I had Speaker 3 breathing from a portable oxygen tank (which Murray does) and swearing it was due to a "totally unrelated" condition (which Murray did), but I chopped that out to lower my word count. I do want to find a way to include that though.

[Verdant Haven]

2nd draft up!

Changelog:

- Condensed the monetary corporate punishments into just Choice 1.
- Redirected Choice 2 to be about criminal charges and holding management personally responsible
- Added additional characterization to the speaker in Choice 3, putting in the stuff about them being on oxygen and claiming its unrelated
- Rewrote Choice 4 to acknowledge the need for an energy sector, and have it be about retraining miners specifically for that purpose.


Thank you for the feedback so far! Please let me know if this helped address those issues, and if you see others.

[Trotterdam]

- Added additional characterization to the speaker in Choice 3, putting in the stuff about them being on oxygen and claiming its unrelated

Don't have him explicitly denying something that nobody accused him of in the first place. Just show signs that he might not be as fine as he claims, and let readers draw their own conclusions.

[Verdant Haven]

- Added additional characterization to the speaker in Choice 3, putting in the stuff about them being on oxygen and claiming its unrelated

Don't have him explicitly denying something that nobody accused him of in the first place. Just show signs that he might not be as fine as he claims, and let readers draw their own conclusions.

Tweaked :-)

[Verdant Haven]

Any further thoughts or feedback for this one? I'd like to work on pushing it forward :-)

[USS Monitor]

It's pretty solid as is.

[Verdant Haven]

It's pretty solid as is.

Thanks!

I'm going to push this to Last Call. I'll submit it early next week if nothing major comes up over the weekend.

[Verdant Haven]

This issue has been submitted! Thank you all for the feedback.

[Australian rePublic]

Good Luck