Defense contractors or farmers are not direct employees either, yet they all found a way to extract maximum revenue from the system by greasing the right wheels.

You can trace it in California politics - the citizens were "in dire need" of high-speed rail back when construction unions poured significant funds into Sacramento, which was then overtaken by water infrastructure buildout (and respective rise of political contributions from farming industry), today it's our youngsters' education that needs critical intervention (and, by extension, underperforming pension plans of educators retired long ago).