Tell me, dear Vespa, when was the last time you drove by a federal or state or county highway job, where there wasn't 3 times the amount of employees as a private contractor?
Oh, and of course there has to be a supervisor for every 3rd employee, so you get about a half a dozen hard hat wearin', self appointed important, Boss' standing around watching so that they at least do it half assed!
I know, I know, I'm asking for the impossible!
Have you ever worked with a private contractor. I have and for a job needing 6 people they send in 4. It is difficult to find any supervisor and when you do track down the person who is ignoring all work, if one questions them they get Huffy.
Crap yes I do see see highway construction every day. Yes there are people hanging about scratching their butt, blowing their nose on their sleeve.
We have to realise that each worker has an assigned job being as driving the big graders, down to the people who manually spread the surfice of the road.
When one job is completed in an area the workers have to wait for others to open the next area.
Sort of like having an electrician who has to wait for the plumber to finish his job. Plumbing first, electrical next.
Same as if you need a new roof on your house and you take the low bid, most likely you get less then you paid for. A truck pulls up and 3 Mexican workers and one supervisor turn up.
The supervisor watches as the crew unload the truck, points at your roof and he drives off for 8 hours.
At the end of the day the Supervisor comes back to pick up his crew, climbs on the roof and walks about and at no time finds any problem. He climbs down and with his crew drives off with your check in his pocket.
2 weeks later the roof is leaking in 3 rooms, you call the company to find they are no longer in business under the name they had when you hired them.
I would rather pay more to a company that sends out 2 extra people, to check the works as it is done.
So is the reason state workers send in a couple extra people to keep an eye on things. It is seldom that a state put in road falls apart in 3 years, a Bridge falls apart in 20 years.
The Big Dig was given over to private contractors Had the State hired engineers and state paid inspectors, the graft and corruption would not have happend. as bad as it did. Oh yes there would have been some sell outs, but when disaster hit, they would have been held accountable.
You asked about state road workers and I went around the barn to get to private contractors VS. State about construction. This has nothing to do with any other State agency, just road or bridge construction, with a bunch of crap about private contractors thrown in.