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Now, to be complete and accurate, we have two self-serving groups of federal employees - the unionized workers as discussed here and the union of senior managers also known as the infamous Senior Executive Service - who are happy to abuse workers at all levels to execute their personal agendas - which is also generally contrary to the taxpayer's interest as well. In fact it's worse. The unions are mostly concerned about hours, wages and expected productivity. The SES actively seeks to undermine or overthrow undesireable policies while imposing their own desired policies - the elected political leadership willy-nilly.

In fairness to the unions they are the product of inept, unpatriotic and corrupt senior management.

in fairness to federal unions, they are voluntary and employees do not have to join them, however unions must represent all members of the bargaining unit whether they are members or not. lots of freeloaders. The amount of official time allotted to union officers and stewards in most cases has been negotiated in bargaining unit contracts and it will be interesting to see how that will be resolved. Fed unions do not negotiate wages those are set by Congress.

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The Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute (FSLMRS aka “the Statute”) is a federal law which establishes collective bargaining rights for most employees of the federal government in the United States. It was established under Title VII of the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978.

The FLRA was adopted after President Jimmy Carter sought legislation to bring comprehensive reform to civil service system and regularize federal labor relations.[1] The Statute consolidated the functions of the Federal Labor Relations Council and the Assistant Secretary of Labor for Labor-Management Relations into a newly established Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA), charged with overseeing elections and protecting federal government employees’ organizing and bargaining rights.. One commentator suggested that the legislative negotiations that resulted in the FSLMRS “so muddied the content and intent of the new agency that no one knew what it was supposed to do or how it was supposed to do it.[2]” Over time, there were modifications in the coverage and responsibilities specified in the Statute.

In passing the Statute, Congress declared that it wished to encourage collective bargaining between federal employees and their employers. Congress declared that collective bargaining is “in the public interest” because, among other things, it “contributes to the effective conduct of public business” and “facilitates and encourages the amicable settlements of disputes between employees and their employers involving conditions of employment.[3]”

.....One important difference between the two laws is the scope of the authorized collective bargaining process. While private-sector employees are entitled to collectively bargain through a representative of their choosing with respect to wages, hours, benefits, and other working conditions, federal employees can collectively bargain with respect to personnel practices only. Thus, federal employees may not negotiate the following working conditions through their exclusive bargaining representative: Wages, Hours, Employee benefits,and Classifications of Jobs.....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Labor_Relations_Act