Air traffic controllers weren’t even allowed to strike given how critical their jobs are and could have paralyzed the entire country. Comparing that to actors is nonsensical.
He called their bluff and brought in replacements. Hollywood can do the same.
This was the exact same paradox that essential healthcare workers faced during the pandemic. Too important to give time off, but not important enough to properly compensate.
Presumably if actors pick this as a hill to die on, well, suddenly there'll be even more surplus supply of actors to demand because the easy roles are VFX, and at that point Hollywood can just break the unions with scabs.
His administration actually made some pretty generous offers in the negotiations. Part of the reason the negotiations broke down is because PATCO's radical wing, which believed that getting the best deal required striking first, ended up in control by the time the Reagan administration came to power. That soured Reagan's position since he felt, despite the generous offers, that the negotiations were being handled in bad faith.