There's no such thing as a free lunch. High union wages come at the price of spending inefficiency, which translates to less goods/services produced per dollar

There's no such thing as a free lunch. High union wages come at the price of spending inefficiency, which translates to less goods/services produced per dollar spent in the public sector, and industrial contraction in the private sector. Look at Detroit: it had the highest wages in the US in 1950. Over the 1950s and 60s, the UAW Union took over the Big Three automakers, with membership peaking in 1979. Around the same time, the US auto industry cratered, and today, Detroit is a shell of its former self and effectively a failed city.