I'm not sure that people in Europe quite "get" the situation in the US. Pensions are pretty much a thing of the past and once you leave your job you have no health coverage (you can buy it for a year under a plan called COBRA.) Unlike most of the rest of the world, when we talk about health benefits we are not talking about "nicer than the standard government health benefits", we are talking about "any" health benefits. One hospital was recently dinged from dumping people who couldn't pay from the ER room -- in their hospital gowns -- out to the local bus station. If you don't have employer insurance you are on your own, with the added little problem that insurance companies are not really that keen on selling "individual" plans even at obscene costs. I got a nice notice from my insurance company that they would no longer cover me because they don't do business in my county anymore, and they were the only provider serving my county! (They got upset that people were questioning why they were not covering transportation costs from my rural area to the hospital for "non life threatening cases" such as having chest pains that turned out to be nothing.) My wife and I were paying these guys over $1200/month, and it wasn't enough for them. The county scrambeled and begged some fly-by-night appearing firm to let us pay obscene prices for even less coverage so we will see how that goes.
Sorry to be off topic but realize that many people are working through old age here because they have to and it kind of strikes a nerve with me. Without health insurance, a weeks stay in the hospital will quickly bankrupt even middle income people. I'm one of the fortunate ones simply because I chose a lucky employer long ago and for along time have been able to do pretty much whatever I want to job-wise, but few people are in my boat, um so to speak.
To bring this back to aircraft, Boeing moved a lot of production to South Carolina which is a "right to work" (union busting) state which means
no pension.