>>512351894>A victorian coal miner had a house and familyNot true about the house. Here in America, most coal miners lived in company owned homes and shopped at company stores and were paid in scrip, not dollars. They were deliberately kept constantly in debt by the coal companies to make sure they remained dependent on their jobs.
Their lives were quite shitty and the fatality rate in the coal mines in those days was astronomically high. Most miners who made a career in coal did live into their 50s or 60s, not dying in a mine accident, but a very large portion did die in the mines.
But yeah, they tended to have sizable families whom they could barely support, and they couldn't afford to lose their jobs no matter how shitty they were treated.
I've worked as a coal miner and the contempt that the office folks have for the miners doing the actual work is still a very real thing. The suits tend to treat the miners like scum. HR women are the worst in that regard. They don't even want to talk to a miner, like it gives them the ick and they become offended if you need something from them.
Not a career path I'd recommend, especially since nowadays, at least in the US, it doesn't seem to have a future. The coal fired plants in the US have been closing by the hundreds over the past 15 years and the export market remains quite small despite some growth. There are fewer than half the number of coal miners today than there were in 2008 and the ones remaining deal with regular layoffs and job changes.
