> Context: Bitcoin miners have just adopted a 50% pay cut for themselves.
Miners don't decide the consensus rules. The nodes validate blocks, and the miners generate them.
The halvening timing was coded a long time ago, and in order to change it, the nodes would need to adopt the new code by installing updated clients, and at that point, you have a hard fork, because there will be nodes on the old rules, either accidentally through not updating or intentionally through using a modified core distro, and you have the new rules' valid blocks is a disjoint set from the old rules'.
The new rules' block set being a subset of the old rules' is a strictening of the consensus rules. A strictening consensus scheme is a soft fork and can keep the network in one piece.
So, there is no real way for the miners to avoid the halvening without a hardfork and a great risk to the network.
The halvening timing was coded a long time ago, and in order to change it, the nodes would need to adopt the new code by installing updated clients, and at that point, you have a hard fork, because there will be nodes on the old rules, either accidentally through not updating or intentionally through using a modified core distro, and you have the new rules' valid blocks is a disjoint set from the old rules'.
The new rules' block set being a subset of the old rules' is a strictening of the consensus rules. A strictening consensus scheme is a soft fork and can keep the network in one piece.
So, there is no real way for the miners to avoid the halvening without a hardfork and a great risk to the network.