I'd like to know where I said they shouldn't retrain for a different career. If my position is in favor of the abolition of coal usage, then obviously all workers within that field under a certain age (there's no particular limit, but let's say 55) should be retrained. My complaint is against (1) the way retraining is currently done in the US since it should include better social and financial support for individuals and communities, (2) the fact that after retraining many/most workers will have to relocate from their current local areas, and (3) the market is still in control of these factors. For example, rather than force coal miners who largely live in Appalachia from having to leave an area that the coal industry, along with the support of the US government, used as a base of extraction and industrial growth, thereby attracting most of the ancestors of the existing population, the government should conduct massive expansion of investment into the area to focus on tapping into its green energy potential, new infrastructure projects, social work projects to tackle the social crisis in the area, and support the growth of local and small businesses throughout Appalachia (the same applies to all suffering areas).
The people and the environment should be put first; the people, through their democratically elected government and empowered personal choices, should be in total control of their local environment and economy and, by extension, their destiny. It's not about paying anyone to "lay around;" it's about mitigating the harmful effects of a financialized market economy that has no regard for environmental impacts or the consequences for human lives. Give the power back to the people, where it belongs, and these people in Appalachia (and elsewhere) will have much better lives. Don't just throw them to the heartless, profit-oriented market and abandon them when the winds of profit change.
*hat tip*
