japanese did not eat us automotive industry alive because of unions. japanese primarily eat the us automotive industry alive because of far superior manufacturing innovation.
They are also responsible for making sure that government grants flow into OEMs instead of generic EV charging infrastructure.
We regularly have reengineering projects for end-of-line testing equipment and other test benches where we are contractually required to guarantee that the new version does not make the personnel operating the equipment redundant (i.e. it may not be more efficient than the 15 year old version). (I won't blame anyone for disbelieving this.)
So, yes, they are very much against manufacturing improvements.