Posted on 10/16/2013 4:47:50 AM PDT by thackney
The 1980s oil bust is what kept me from becoming a petroleum geologist. Saw it coming about six months before it hit and changed my major. Everyone at the time thought I was nuts. But folks who were in the program with me didn’t have jobs in their field a decade later. Hopefully they are doing well now.
I can relate. I wanted to be a nuclear engineer about the time of Three Mile Island.
I was in Midland in the early eighties, there were no homes or apartments available. Lived in the Holiday Inn for 4 months, never stayed in one again;^)
We had geologists working in the file room at Chevron, hoping to stay close to their field in case things came back. They never did.
My wife and I moved to Odessa about a month ago, and we love this place! I’ve been through two booms and busted out each time so we aren’t driven by the big money which is here in abundance. After working in the food ministry in Tennessee for the past year, it is certainly a breath of fresh air to see jobs everywhere and happy, prosperous people. I was in town less than twelve hours and found what I can only describe as the perfect job; working as a gunsmith in a West Texas gun shop.
All of the old timers talk about the boom and bust cycles, and they all say that another bust will come. When is the question.
We just passed Saudi Arabia in oil production.
I’m sure Bam bam’s Arabian masters let him know about it ......
USAUSAUSAUSA!!!!
My family has been in the oil industry for about 100 yrs and have witnessed many booms and busts. My father had seen it before and that’s why he took the offer to sell his drilling company and mud company in 1980. He always told me that it is either chicken or feathers.
Danial Yeargin’s book the Prize points out the booms and busts that have occurred ever since Col. Drake drilled the first well in 1859. Anyone involved in the current boom would be well advised to put something back.
Smart dad. Mine sold out in ‘82. Always said it was chicken one week, feathers the next.
Just described every town in the US boom or bust. Interviewing the mayor about preparing for a bust as he builds a new skyscraper in a faded west Texas town with vacant buildings and on the tax payers dime. BTW Midland was a thriving town before the boom. Also the article did not mention the boom is expected to last 15 to 20 years. The media sucks.
Maybe if you count items beside oil as oil production.
But in actual crude oil production, no. Not even close.
U.S. Production of Crude Oil = 7.487 million barrels a day.
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MCRFPUS2&f=M
Saudi Arabia Production of Crude Oil = 9.840 million barrels a day.
http://www.eia.gov/cfapps/ipdbproject/iedindex3.cfm?tid=50&pid=57&aid=1&cid=SA,US,&syid=2013&eyid=2013&freq=M&unit=TBPD
You have to count Natural Gas Liquids, Refinery Processing gain, etc before the US to get to those misleading numbers.
The only downside I see in the booming economy in Texas
is all the New York, Illinois, Michigan, etc. license plates
I see on the road here in Houston. We’re being invaded by
the slum rats that fouled their own nest and are moving to
greener pastures to foul.
I see constant nailbiting from people involved in crude and sand transportation by rail and it's constantly over the "spread"... there is a lot of money to be made and capital needs to be spent to efficiently bring crude to market.
Anyways an article saying that towns are bracing for some imminent bust, is just a bunch of fear mongering... sure, it will happen (bust), but rapture can come at any time... let's, in the meanwhile, make some coin.
Mansions should be built with old folks in mind for bust. They can maintain the places in retirement until the boom hopefully returns.
Midland and Odessa aren’t the only ones. I traveled through Guymon OK and Woodward a few months ago. Oil money everywhere! Lots of oil money in central OK again.
Farmington NM is again booming. Wish I was there but my worthless brother-in-law(If you know him he probably owes you money) is fouling up the area.
When the bust comes again, it will hurt as it did 58 years ago.
Exactly so. So long as oil isabove $70/bbl. the fracking will continue. Besides, with the multi-billion investment by the oil companies, increasing world demand for oil and gas the incredibly huge fields, this boom isn't going anywhere for a while.
I'm not saying you're wrong, but:
New York, Illinois, and Michigan are all beautiful places that are stuck with a giant urban hellhole.
I think it's likely that most of the transplants come from parts of those states not named Detroit, Chicago, or NYC.
“We’re being invaded by the slum rats that fouled their own nest and are moving to greener pastures to foul.”
I see the same thing in ND, about every other license plate is from a different state. With this the crime rate is going up in places like Williston.
But most of them are the ones that want to work, many listen to Rush Limbaugh and tend to vote Republican.
The typical slum rat of a democrat run city has no reason to go where the work is.
Oil town prepared for a bust? Boy that’s a laugh when talking about public sector spending in Republican Midland County.
The various taxing entities in the county are currently up to 831 million dollars in principal and usury debt and the perfumed princes at MISD are promoting ANOTHER school bond——this one to be for half a billion plus interest.
The poobahs in Odessa are jealous and are energetically trying to pass Midland in indebtedness.
New California-— errr, I meanTexas, has around a third of a trillion dollars in local debt.
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