Why should a freelancer accept court work when the pay is lower? Am I missing something?

Why do court work when the page rate is lower?  My disclaimer right upfront is I am just beginning to see more frequently freelancers doing court work, so please forgive my ignorance.

There has been a recent increase in requests for freelancers to do court work given the layoffs of officials in Southern California.  The page rate for court work is lower.  Maybe the per diem helps make up the freelance to official page rate?   I don't know.  Officials, I believe, are able to work in the court environment regarding pay because they have other benefits included in their job/pay.  Freelancers are independent and must provide their own health insurance and retirement benefits.

Given these differences, can anyone provide more information?  If you've done court work as a freelancer, please enlighten me.  Again,  I don't have a complete understanding of freelancers working in court, and it feels terrible to replace an official who was laid off.  It's painful to even ask these questions. 

Denise 

I have always been willing to work in court when available, and it helps in a lot of ways.  You get to know more attorneys and they get to know you.  Court work can be difficult, especially in the beginning, so you will learn a lot.  When covering a trial you get to see how they use our transcripts/video depositions, how objections are handled, etc.  It gives you a greater understanding of our profession.

Sometimes the freelance work is slow, but once you work in court and form some good working relationships you can get a gread deal of work from them.  I'm not in the position of working in place of a reporter who was laid off so I empathize with your feelings, but it's still better that they are using a court reporter versus a tape recorder! 

I help out the officials (who in my area only cover criminal) when they need help because they usually give me the big jobs that will probably appeal, so it's a lot of pages that I pay no commission on.  And sometimes you hit the jackpot -- I just did a 2-1/2 week murder trial, and because the issue was a hot topic (the Stand Your Ground law in Florida) I'm getting all kinds of people inquiring about copy sales.