Oh, God no. You have your labor history backwards, my friend. The Great Depression fueled the labor movement in ways nothing else could. That time of desperation is what inspired an entire generation to fight back against capitalism and its failure to elevate the needs of the common good. The utter disregard for the consequences of unregulated greed led to the worst economic collapse in modern history. Millions of people paid the price for their arrogance and short-sightedness.

Those programs were a thumb in the eye of the capitalists that crashed the global economy, and cost that entire generation its promised future. The so-called welfare state was the resulting penance the Capitalists were made to pay, in compensation for that mismanagement. And people everywhere were not only fed up with accepting their idea of prosperity...they were refusing to be used as tools to create wealth for someone else. That is what strengthened unions.

For a brief time, governments around the world actually tried to hold those capitalists responsible for the suffering they had caused. Knowing that the government itself stood with them, inspired millions to fight for workers rights. The labor movement expanded greatly after the depression, as a direct response to it...not the other way around.