Right.
Why is it that unions in the USA are (regarded) so different(ly) from f.ex. Western Europe (I know nothing of Japanese unions) ?
A very large fraction of the Western European work force is unionized and few consider that a problem. On the contrary, in some (or several?) countries, the unions are largely regarded as being the sole cause of a very high living standard, with minimum wage, maximum work hours per week, minimum annual vacation, state-backed unemployment insurance, things achieved in the 20th century. Things that cause people to not worry too much about the survival of themselves and their families, so they can be productive at work instead, and fewer have to worry about becoming victim of a robbery from some poor, desperate, unemployed person.
As a possible but surely incomplete part of the answer I would like to point out that the ideologue Karl Marx was very suspicious of unions, since he feared that they would lead the workers to become integrated into the capitalist society, as opposed to overturning it - and it seems that regarding Europe he was right, on that issue.
So what is different in the USA?
