According to the Wikipedia page for the CEO, he grew up in a mining family and his father was paralyzed in a mine accident when he was nine.
I've always found it ironic that the most hard-hearted CEOs tend to be the ones who come from poor backgrounds (Don Blankenship is another example). Contrast them with people like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, who grew up in well-to-do families and have more sense of noblesse oblige.
Ironic, but not surprising. Those who truly rose from poverty are more likely to have a mindset of "I was successful so why should my money go to those @#$%* lazy *&^%$# who aren't." Whereas those who are born to comfort are more likely to have know some opebo-types who plan on lazily spending their parent's money and thus be skeptical of the advantages of wealth.
Coal barons Murray and Blankenship are jungle-fighters more like Gilded-Age tycoons. Jungle fighters -- the analogy being to those who see themselves the enforcers of the Law of the Jungle and business and politics a jungle -- have a mindset that few of us now have. The closest analogues in mindset would be crime lords except that coal is a respected object of trade and heroin isn't. They have fought for everything that they get and thy fight unions, politicians, and the media at every turn. That unions, the media, and liberals in government are respected parts of the Establishment make them feel as isolated as the
tiger that has no friends. They are consummately ruthless and reactionary.
