nice work if you can get it

We've had people here working on the roof. They started August 5th. They finished about five weeks later. 

Then they moved on to working on the back deck, Well, they were supposed to; they actually only started on the back deck this week.

Nine weeks of clomping, banging, sawing, hammering, nailgunning... Nails strewn all over, bits of roofing material in the trees... It's like having Mr O'Reilly here all year round.

I thought it was only in China and Soviet Russia that people got jobs for life...