Hurricanes - nature's way to wealth redistribution

Hurricane Sandy is expected to do billions of dollars of damage. A pessimist would look on this as a loss, but, ever the optimist, I see this as a wonderful boost to local economies and a redistribution of wealth. There will be basements to pump, trees to clear, windows to replace, roofs to repair, lawn gnomes to recover. Most of this will be done with local labor, putting work in the hands of people who could use it.

In the best cases, insurance claims will be picking up the tab. That's a Robin Hood scenario, where we steal from the dividend payments of stockholders, and place it in the pockets of people who work with their hands. OTOH, I do own stock in insurance companies, and don't work with my hands, so this is not really directly serving my interests. Blimey, this redistribution of wealth is trickier than I thought.