CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: PHOTOGRAPH BY TRAVIS DOVE FOR BLOOMBERG BUSINESSWEEK; DANIEL ACKER/BLOOMBERG; PAM FRANCIS/GETTY IMAGES
Politics/Policy for decades along the Neuse River, which runs through the heart of North Carolina hog country before emptying into the Pamlico Sound. The expansion of North Carolina’s poultry industry is adding to environmental hazards. While the total number of hog lagoons has been capped since the late 1990s, chicken production has grown by more than 42 percent to 795 million birds last year from 559 million in 1992. From a small airplane above Duplin County, it’s easy to spot the long, metal-roofed buildings for chickens. Poultry doesn’t produce as much liquid waste, but its litter is also spread on fields and can release nitrogen into groundwater or waterways. Residents say they don’t think anything will change without the federal government’s involvement. “EPA needs to do what it should do, because we’re living with this on our land,” says Elsie Herring, who lives in Wallace, N.C., next to a field where the liquefied manure is sprayed. Former regulators say it’s much harder to deal with agricultural runoff than factories. “The idea of treating a farm like a DuPont chemical plant is not good government or good business,” says Sally Shaver, a former EPA official who consults with the hog industry on environmental issues. “I don’t think there would be problems if these things didn’t stink.” —Mark Drajem The bottom line The federal government hasn’t made progress on promises to reduce the environmental impact of animal feedlots.
Campaign 2016
Scott Walker’s Favorite Union Shop A Harley fan, he looks the other way on its business practices “There were unions involved, and there was government assistance”
For Republican presidential candidate Scott Walker, the Harley-Davidson motorcycle is a symbol of American freedom and independence. The Wisconsin governor, a dedicated hog rider, stages campaign events at Harley dealerships and routinely invokes the Milwaukee-based brand during speeches. “I’m a guy with a wife and two kids and a Harley,” he said in his
closing statement at the Aug. 6 Republican debate. Yet Harley has succeeded thanks to two things that Walker’s staked his career battling: government handdouts and labor unions. Since 2000, the motorcy-cle manufacturer has received ceived $54.5 million in local and nd state tax incentives and more e than $2 billion in federal guarantees, according to Good Jobs First, a unionbacked Washington nonprofit that tracks corporate subsidies. Its plants have been used as examples of how management can work with unions—Harley workers are represented by United Steelworkers and the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers—to make production more efficient and keep high-wage factory jobs in the U.S. “Harley is often held up as an American success story,” says Barry Burden, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. “There were unions involved, and there was government assistance at various times. It hasn’t just been market forces that have made that happen.” The company was among those that benefited from the Federal Reserve’s decision to backstop the commercial paper market at the height of the financial crisis in 2008 and 2009, lending government support to short-term corporate debt. The Fed guaranteed more than $2 billion worth of Harley securities, according to the Good Jobs First data. “As one of many companies that issue commercial paper, HarleyDavidson was part of the program for less than four months,” says company spokeswoman Maripat Blankenheim. Harley has also received millions in state assistance, chiefly from Missouri, where it opened a factory in 1998 after asking several states for economic development incentive offers. The state has awarded the company about $44 million, according to Good Jobs First. Much of it came in the form of a reduction in Harley’s state income taxes in exchange for meeting hiring and other goals. In Wisconsin, the company got $2.3 million in local subsidies, all before Walker took office in January 2011. Blankenheim says the company also qualified for $8.3 million in worker training and other credits made available when Harley updated and expanded its product development
and man manufacturing anu facilities in th e the early 2000s. In 2010, form m Wisconsin Governor former Jim m Doyle, Walker’s predecessor, c ssor, offered Harley as much as cesso $25 in state tax credits in 25 million m exchange for the company keeping e excha its factories there. Days after fa Walker was elected governor in W November 2010, Harley announced Nove that would decline the nine-year tax th it w credit d deal because it might not be able to mee meet all of the state requirements. Walker first attracted national attention in 2011 for championing a new law restricting public unions in his home state, and he then sur“He is passionate vived a union-led recall about our brand, in 2012. “Washington like the millions of other loyal seems to think that Harley-Davidson success is measured by customers around how many people are the world” dependent on the government,” he said in his July 13 campaign announcement. “We measure success by just the opposite—by how many people are no longer dependent on the government.” The owner of a 2003 Harley-Davidson 29 Road King, Walker participated in a June ride hosted by Iowa Republican Senator Joni Ernst and says he plans to ride in New Hampshire and South Carolina, too. In July, he staged campaign events at three Harley franchises and another shop that sells the bikes. “Governor Walker has fought for the last four years to retain and help create jobs in Wisconsin,” Walker campaign spokeswoman AshLee Strong said in a statement. “He is proud to support homegrown Wisconsin companies like Harley-Davidson that help keep workers on the job and keep the state’s economy moving.” Harley says it’s flattered by Walker’s attention, but it doesn’t want to be drawn into the presidential race. “He is passionate about our brand, like the millions of other loyal Harley-Davidson customers around the world,” Harley’s Blankenheim said in a statement. “Harley-Davidson Motor Company does not endorse any candidate and remains neutral in political campaigns.” —John McCormick The bottom line Harley-Davidson has cultivated labor ties and government support, but one GOP candidate doesn’t mind. Edited by Allison Hoffman Bloomberg.com
