Hurricane devastation moves to the south

With Bush's suspension of the Davis Bacon Act of 1931, which requires federal contractors to pay workers the prevailing wage. The decision was an obvious hand-out to businesses (the prevailing construction wage in New Orleans is $9 or $10 per hour) without a clause requiring them to pass the savings on to the government. Instead, many illegal immigrants have been hired to do the job. While that is nothing terrible on its own (although it would be desirable to use local labor), many employers force their workers to live in squalid conditions and pay them $7 per hour, or sometimes nothing at all. Because the workers are illegally in the country, they may be reluctant to complain about the abuses and they risk being deported. These labor abuses undermine the economic recovery of the region and are wrong regardless of the circumstances.