They make big bucks. Free insurance. No copays. The changes the company wants is only for new hires. The union says no, so they locked them out.
Having been raised in a union family, been in a union and worked at a union facility as a non-union engineer, I’m 100% against unions. I saw union thugery at work all three times. The IBEW sent a couple of heavies to convince my dad to drop out of a union election. He met the with his hand on a gun and ran them off. He lost. He said they did the changed who did the counting. The Retail Clerks ran the chain I worked at out of business, so we all lost our jobs. As an engineer, I had union guys pull tricks on me so they could accuse me of breaking rules. The accusation netted them an extra $250 each in penalties and I got written up. Unions are evil.