unions

It does depend on the state you live in and the industry you work in. This is just my opinion, but I get the sense that a rather significant proportion of the US population regards any kind of assistance as synonymous with admitting defeat. It's not just unions, but for any kind of welfare too, people think they are leeches if they have to ask for help. But it's what our tax money is for; we pay a certain percentage of our income to support the unemployed and medically needy. We also have food programs and shelter to provide to the poor and homeless. Many of these programs don't get enough funding to provide enough for those in need because their use is stigmatized and importance minimized in our culture. The propaganda about the American dream is at least in part responsible, I think. When people speak against welfare programs you hear a lot of selfish talk, such as, "I work hard, why would I pay more taxes so that someone else can sit on their ass all day?" Or sometimes these heated discussions have a racist overtone; that immigrants will come and sponge off our welfare programs if we expand them. Whether that is true or not is irrelevant to me. Compassion for fellow citizens is the point for me and it's why I would support any assistance programs no matter the risk of whether bad actors will try to take advantage, that's the government's responsibility to provide a tidy set of policies so that help falls into the hands of those truly in need.

Sorry for the digression but I see the attitudes about welfare as linked to that about unions. Many citizens don't believe that unions would have their best interests in mind (as with government on welfare programs) and that to pay dues would be simply to line the pockets of the union reps at the top for little to no benefit. Some people also buy into the notion that they can rather earn the trust and loyalty of their employer by working hard and that working hard is a virtue in and of itself. If they mean working hard to achieve a personal goal, then I do see the virtue of that point of view, but otherwise, I disagree, work is simply a means of making an income to support life in society.

Oh, they've been villainized my entire life. I grew up believing that they caused harm. I'm super-pro union, now. But I had to radically shift my politics before that happened and I wasn't ever even on the Right.