[blam]

"If you are unemployed in some place like Michigan or Pennsylvania, where democrats have killed any economic growth, I suggest you move to New Orleans or at least temporarily relocate there. You will be working for the next 3 years."

The headlines in the Mobile Register yesterday was complaining about the labor shortage here and in the region.

My youngest brother told me he was offered a job towing travel trailers (using his truck) from Hattiesburg, Miss to Biloxi, Miss, hooking up to the drain, electricity and water = $,1,000.00 each.(All hook-up parts are supplied)
He estimated that he and one helper could do three a day. His present boss told him he could have a leave-of-absence to take advantage of that offer.

[jwpjr]

I was in NO and Jefferson Parish, and Biloxi and Pascagoula and Gulfport, the week after Katrina. I had a contract with one of the big disaster recovery contractors to photograph their crews at work. One of the groups I spent time with were the guys who were removing debris. These guys come from all over the country. The ones I was with have a truck-trailer combination with a crane attached for loading and unloading the debris. They are paid $6 a cubic yard to haul debris to the dump site. The big rigs can carry 70 cubic yards a load, or $420 a load. They are independent contractors in every sense of the word, so it's up to them if they are going to make it worth their while to be there. They average 10 loads a day, or about $4,200 a day. The work seven-days-a-week from sunup to sundown.

The level of regulation these guys have to deal with is staggering. Everyone has a finger in the pie of telling them what they can do and how they can do it.

As your brother has learned, there is a good living to be made if you have the equipment and the desire to work.

I can't tell you how happy I was to be on the Pontchartrain Causeway headed back to Central Florida!