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Companies had various ways of cheating miners. One way was cribbing. Miners were paid by the ton, but the companies would have cars that, instead of holding a ton, would hold 2,500 pounds instead, thus cheating the miners. As companies increased wages, they would increase prices in the company store to remove any wage increase. When a cart came out, miners were deducted for any shale that was in the cart. The shale was not weighed nor was the cart investigated, a company man would just arbitrarily decide what percentage of the cart was not usable coal and dock the miner’s wage.
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