A good friend of mine works for a large construction firm that has bid on some of the California high speed rail jobs. He said that for much of the work (particularly moving existing utility infrastructure) there are no firms bidding, or at most one firm. They therefore know they can jack up the price to 2-3X normal costs. The work needs to happen in places where there are literally no construction workers, and crews don't want to go to where the work needs to be done since there is other work close to their house.