During the Great Depression, my father toiled in a box factory. The workers were all flat broke, he recalled, and desperate for every nickel. But when overtime hours appeared, the men made sure they went to a guy with kids. The laborers were obeying the unwritten and unenforceable "humanity clause," whereby one gives up some personal gain in deference to another's screaming need.
My father later built a prosperous small business and became a reliable Republican (until the Bill Clinton impeachment). But he never saw working people as nobodies. Profits, while important, were not all.
A lack of similar empathy is what many find most disquieting about Mitt Romney, whose private-equity firm pumped his fortune to perhaps $250 million. It's more than just the nature of the business. It was a certain inhumanity of the Bostonians running Bain Capital, namely Mitt.
Private equity executives argue that by wringing costs out of the companies they buy, the firms emerge stronger. They often save ailing businesses for the good of the workers, as well as the investors.
Boston-based Bain became involved with Steel Dynamics about two months after the company formed in 1993. At that point, the management team had already sought incentive packages from the state and county. Stickler said Bain executives were well-briefed on the proposed deal and noted that they were particularly thorough in examining the intricacies of the deals' structure.
"They lifted up every rock, they stress-tested every financial scenario," Stickler said. "Before they put their money into a transaction, they wanted to know that as many of the risks have been mitigated as possible."
A spokesman for Bain said Thursday that the private equity firm "has had a 28-year track record of growing great companies, including partnering with the management team to help to launch and grow Steel Dynamics. We are extremely proud of the work our employees have done throughout our history to build our businesses and improve their operations."
In DeKalb County, the tax incentives rankled some local residents, who protested the deal at county government meetings.
Tim Heffley, then a Democratic county commissioner, was opposed to the new tax but was outvoted. "I was just against any company getting handouts from the government, corporate welfare," said Heffley, who nevertheless praised Steel Dynamics as a good company that has brought jobs to the region.
Nearly two decades later, some are still smarting about the subsidies.
"It was something very upsetting to me," said Beaman, a longtime Republican activist. "I hated to see the people I thought were my friends go toward the liberal socialist mind-set under the guise of creating jobs. Our government shouldn't be in the business of buying or funding companies. That is contrary to the whole conservative mind-set."
Still, Beaman said she didn't hold the incident against Romney, questioning whether he had a "true understanding of economics."
"Did he do that knowing the full ramifications of where that type of government leads?" she said. "Probably not.
My father later built a prosperous small business and became a reliable Republican (until the Bill Clinton impeachment). But he never saw working people as nobodies. Profits, while important, were not all.
A lack of similar empathy is what many find most disquieting about Mitt Romney, whose private-equity firm pumped his fortune to perhaps $250 million. It's more than just the nature of the business. It was a certain inhumanity of the Bostonians running Bain Capital, namely Mitt.
Private equity executives argue that by wringing costs out of the companies they buy, the firms emerge stronger. They often save ailing businesses for the good of the workers, as well as the investors.
Boston-based Bain became involved with Steel Dynamics about two months after the company formed in 1993. At that point, the management team had already sought incentive packages from the state and county. Stickler said Bain executives were well-briefed on the proposed deal and noted that they were particularly thorough in examining the intricacies of the deals' structure.
"They lifted up every rock, they stress-tested every financial scenario," Stickler said. "Before they put their money into a transaction, they wanted to know that as many of the risks have been mitigated as possible."
A spokesman for Bain said Thursday that the private equity firm "has had a 28-year track record of growing great companies, including partnering with the management team to help to launch and grow Steel Dynamics. We are extremely proud of the work our employees have done throughout our history to build our businesses and improve their operations."
In DeKalb County, the tax incentives rankled some local residents, who protested the deal at county government meetings.
Tim Heffley, then a Democratic county commissioner, was opposed to the new tax but was outvoted. "I was just against any company getting handouts from the government, corporate welfare," said Heffley, who nevertheless praised Steel Dynamics as a good company that has brought jobs to the region.
Nearly two decades later, some are still smarting about the subsidies.
"It was something very upsetting to me," said Beaman, a longtime Republican activist. "I hated to see the people I thought were my friends go toward the liberal socialist mind-set under the guise of creating jobs. Our government shouldn't be in the business of buying or funding companies. That is contrary to the whole conservative mind-set."
Still, Beaman said she didn't hold the incident against Romney, questioning whether he had a "true understanding of economics."
"Did he do that knowing the full ramifications of where that type of government leads?" she said. "Probably not.
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