Bain Workers Bus Tour Slams 'Romney Economy' In Swing State Excursion

A coalition of current and former employees at companies purchased by Bain Capital will spend the next month rolling through the swing states of Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania, and Virginia protesting Bain's business practices and the economic plan of its founder and longtime chairman, Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney. 

"Bain workers know firsthand what a Romney-Bain Economy looks like," the group wrote on its website. "Outsourcing the good jobs to China, [and] leaving mostly low-wage jobs with limited benefits here in our communities."

Calvin Johnson, a Detroit native who teaches music at the Bain Capital-owned Guitar Center, told the crowd how difficult it is for him to live on the $8 an hour wage he earns. “I’m worrying [about] how I’m going to pay this bill, that bill and nobody should have to worry about that. I joined this movement to raise awareness that we really need to raise the minimum wage," Johnson said, offering one of the group's rallying cries. "We can’t survive on $7.25!”

Romney frequently points to his leadership of Bain as one of his key qualifications to be president, writing in an op-ed last month that "The lessons I learned over my 15 years at Bain Capital … would help me as president to fix our economy, create jobs and get things done in Washington."

But in a 1985 video of Romney unearthed on Thursday, the former Massachusetts governor can be seen explaining Bain Capital's purpose. The partnership, he says, "was formed to invest in startup companies and ongoing companies, then to take an active hand in managing them and hopefully, five to eight years later, to harvest them at a significant profit."