In 2023, the GDP of Kentucky amounted to around 224.42 billion U.S. dollars. The manufacturing industry added the most real value to the gross domestic product of Kentucky, amounting to around 37.78 billion U.S. dollars. In the same year, the professional and business services industry contributed around 22.94 billion U.S. dollars.

West Virginia was the state with the most coal-mining jobs in the United States, with some 14,014 employees in 2023. The state's coal mining employment has been in decline since 2010, when just over 21,000 people were working in the sector. By comparison, there were 5,029 jobs in this industry in Kentucky in 2023, which was the second-largest coal mining employer state. Coal-mining employment in the U.S. Of all U.S. coal-producing regions, the Appalachian region held the most significant portion of available coal-mining jobs, amounting to over 26,000 employees in total in 2023. The total coal-mining employment in the United States reached 45,443 jobs in that same year. More than half of those jobs were in underground mines. Similarly, in West Virginia, there were 10,219 underground mining jobs and 2,778 surface mining jobs as of 2022. U.S. mining industry employment breakdown The entire U.S. mining industry employed some 182,000 people (with the exclusion of the oil and gas sector, which is also considered mining) in 2022. U.S. coal mining employment increased in the early 2010s due to increases in exports and decreases within local coal mines. Decreases in productivity within the mines require more workers per unit of production. Although energy derived from coal still accounts for a large part of the United States' electricity production, the U.S. solar power industry is currently providing many more jobs than the coal mining industry.

Once a major powerhouse of the British economy, the coal mining industry was the lifeblood of several regions, providing employment to more than one million workers before the 1930s. Since that time, shifting attitudes towards coal and the emergence of alternative energy sources such as wind and solar have seen coal's role in the UK's energy mix diminish. By 1990, the coal industry was still an employer to some 50,000 people, however from 2016 onwards, this figure had fallen to less than one thousand. Coal mines in the UK As of 2023, there were seven UK coal mines left in operation. Of these, one was an opencast site and six were deep mines. The British government has made it clear that phasing out coal is necessary for the country to reach its goal of carbon neutrality by 2050. The industry is thus set to further contract in the future. Coal job cuts globally The shrinking number of jobs has not been isolated to the UK, with similar coal mining employment reductions in the United States. In some U.S. states, such as Kentucky, coal mining jobs had fallen by more than three quarters in the past ten years. In Australia, where coal mining has traditionally been as strong contributor to the economy, this decreasing trend is also visible.