LAFITTE, La. — In Louisiana, the price of everything is going up — especially if you're a shrimper.
But the one thing that's cheaper than ever is the shrimp they're catching.
"You can barely make it with the price of ice at $22 a block and fuel at almost $5 a gallon," Michael Lobue Sr., a Barataria shrimper, said. "You can't make it."
Despite the prices we're seeing at restaurants and grocery stores, shrimpers are getting around $1.60-per-pound for fresh Louisiana shrimp.
That's less than half of what shrimpers told us they should be getting — around $4-a-pound.
"I catch 2,000 lbs, that's $3,200. That's my expense," Shrimper Lanvin LeBlanc said. "So, I might have enough fuel to work another day or two, maybe. If I don't catch nothing, I don't make nothing."
LeBlanc has been shrimping his whole life. It's a family business that's been good to him for decades, but he doesn't know how much longer he'll last if prices keep dropping.
"We're trying to figure out who's setting the prices. I don't think anyone can find out," he said. "We need help."
Now, he's hoping someone will do something before it's too late and a Louisiana way of life disappears.;
"We've been falling on deaf ears for a long time and we need help," LeBlanc said. "Who's going to step up to the plate and help us is yet to be seen."
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