NMA attacks government’s coal royalty change

The US National Mining Association (NMA) has criticised the “false assumptions” behind the US government’s proposed coal royalty change, calling it an “election-year stunt” that will hurt consumers.

“While claiming action in the name of the US taxpayer, this latest assault on the coal industry is nothing more than another covert operation in the administration’s ‘keep in the ground’ campaign” the NMA said in a media statement.

“The casualties will be an industry that has worked diligently to provide Americans with low cost, reliable energy and the low-income families who rely on that energy.”

According to the NMA, coal royalty rates are already above market, delivering almost 40 cents for every dollar in federal coal sales to the government. This undermines the “specious claim that somehow taxpayers are being cheated.”

“All this at a time when the industry is being arbitrarily punished by the administration for providing low-cost energy, while at the same time hemorrhaging high-wage hobs – more than 67 400 since 2011 – in some of the nation’s most economically depressed areas.”

Edited by Jonathan Rowland.

Read the article online at: https://www.worldcoal.com/coal/08072016/nma-attacks-governments-coal-royalty-change-2016-2000/