It isn't 100% causality, but it was definitely one of the ways it was sold to people through PR/propaganda.

Free trade / globalism was the larger "true" move, and yes getting away from unions and high wages to maximize profits was a big part.

Corporations made a change from valuing stakeholder value (employees, communities, customers, suppliers, the nation) to pure shareholder value (profits over everything else, despite the long term result that profits by any and all means hurts all stakeholders and eventually can cannibalize the company unless you have monopolistic moats).