Primarily it was their completely unnecessary trampling of the air traffic controllers union that fired the pistol inaugurating the rape of the working class.
Government is a mirror before an ape: private agents see the State acting a certain way and they reproduce that behavior, however unconsciously. In this case, private sector employers aped Reagan's union-busting.
I do not love public sector unions. Or non-industrial unions. Or America's myopic, collaborationist unions more generally. But Reagan is undoubtedly to blame for deunionization - and hypocritically so, given his own love for the Screen Actors Guild (hardworking actors require unions; layabout machinists and electricians, evidently, do not).
Trampling that particular union was hardly unneccessary. They broke the law, Reagan gave them an ultimatum, most of the strikers ignored it, they got fired. In the end, Reagan upheld the law in the face of those determined to break it. To not have done so would have been an embarrassing defeat. The only reason that I can think of for that action being somewhat morally murky is because PATCO had endorsed Reagan in last years election, and thus it was something of a slap in the face. But when all's said and done a self-inflicted one.
Ha! Again, complicating the issue with a load of BS that makes you look "smart". Another conservative that expects the unions to obey the laws that are designed to enslave them. Can you just understand that we would like to eat? Jesus dick! It's not complicated!
Firstly, why are you so angry? Are you afflicted with rabies or something? Secondly, I wasn't trying to make myself look 'smart', since such efforts (in my case) would prove to be about as fruitful as Operation Barbarossa. Thirdly, of course I expect unions to obey the law. I'm not a union member, there are no union members in my family, so I tend to be unfavourable to efforts by unions to stick a hand up the backside of the government and use it as a glove puppet to advance the interests of their members, interests with run counter to those of people who end up having to pay for their increased wages and so on and so forth. Finally, of course I understand that you people want to eat. I myself like to eat. But if we look at the case of the air traffic controllers, what can be seen is that they were doing reasonably well prior to the strike, and that it was due to the disastrous decision to remain on strike that so many of them lost their jobs and were thrown into poverty. So, one could actually argue that the plight of the workers was PATCO's fault, not Reagan's.
