The civil trial set for Monday originally was scheduled for February 2012, but Barbier delayed it to allow BP to wrap up a settlement with a team of private attorneys representing residents and businesses that claimed economic losses from the spill.
Job losses in the public sector spill over into the private sector as well, as competition for too few jobs leaves too many people unemployed without the ability to spend money in the broader economy.
Feinberg has said he plans to apply tort-law principles in weighing claims, meaning plaintiffs will have to show that their losses wouldn't have occurred but for the oil spill.