It's likely that the pension was a guaranteed payout type, not a guaranteed contribution. The former can't help but fail, unless the economy is all rainbows and unicorns- they usually guarantee rates that aren't sustainable and GM's pension is a shining example of this. It's also the reason they needed to be bailed out. The numbers I read and heard was that every vehicle GM sold included a $1500 cost for retirees' pensions.

Obama has his own best interests in mind and he knows unions vote Democratic.

My dad was in a union and he used to invite some of the guys from Harley over. They bitched about how much they made and said they wanted more money, with the justification that "They make XX times our hourly rate on every bike". I didn't win any fans by asking who bought the land, improved it, built the factories, bought the machinery and materials, who pays them, who tolerated the strike, etc. My first personal exposure to the effects of a union was when I had a summer job the year I graduated High School. The Teamsters went on strike and I couldn't work because the lumber yard had to close (union yard). I made squat because they wanted MORE, MORE, MORE. Harley going on strike didn't help my views, either. One thing that pissed me off was seeing foreign vehicles in the '70s with "Buy Union" bumper stickers on them.

When an employer abuses their employees, they need protection but what people deal with now is NOTHING like the kind of things that happened in the late 19th-early 20th Centuries.

I have yet to talk to a union member who understands that their higher wages cause increased prices at the store. Obviously, foreign-made products don't affect this as much, but for US-made goods, it can't be argued.