“I appreciate the arguments of the expense of paying a lot of money for sleepers so think the problem there is unionization”
So leave unions out of it. Would you pay what you call “sleepers” at all, and if so, how would you score their jobs?
If a sleeper ever got called out and carried you out of your burning house, would you pay a bonus, or is that included in your base rate?
Full disclosure: my B-I-L is an urban, unionized fire captain.
That is, he’s a unionized fire captain when he is not wearing the green in Afghanistan.