Is it true that there's a oil boom in North Dakota right now?

[Keith and stuff]

because it's short lived? or what?

Right, it won't last so all of the infrastructure needed for the added workers is not being built. Because of that, it is harder to get a motel room, eat at a restaurant, stay at a campground and so on in much of ND than it used to be. The boom is likely good for ND and good for the US, but it isn't good for famlies looking to vote with their feet. It is great for single men without kids looking for jobs and willing to live is in a tight, uncomfortable living situation, though.

Read about it.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2...-jobs/1674409/

This 24-year old father from Minneapolis came here looking for work.

He lived in his car for the first couple weeks and much of his possessions still do; this while his girlfriend and 2-year-old daughter live back home in Minneapolis.

"This is my favorite picture," he said of his daughter.

"How often do you look at those?" asked reporter Jay Olstad.

"I try not to actually, try to keep my mind off of it," he replied.

Barely making ends meet in the Twin Cities, he made the difficult decision to temporarily leave his family behind in hopes of finding a better life here.

The only problem, if you don't have experience in the oil fields, finding a job at one of the oil companies is almost as hard as finding a place to sleep.

There are so many people here. The population has nearly doubled in only a few years and affordable for some is outrageous to others.

"$700 a week and they call it affordable housing," he said with a smile, referring to an advertisement for a new hotel in town.

Pavlacky came to Williston with his brother-in-law Zach Betland.

"We've been surviving off of Raman noodles and Chef Boyardee," said Betland.

Both eventually found a place to stay, living in a tent at a campsite 15 miles outside of town.

Although both had jobs at McDonalds, they could not afford much when we met up with them, eating maybe once a day. Pavlacky says he's lost 15 pounds so far.

That's why they knew they have to find something better, and fast.

Tyler spends a lot of his time at the Williston Job Center looking for better jobs. And he's not the only one.

"I have never seen anything like this before," said Cindy Stanford, the job center manager.

She says this small office gets 200 people in here a day looking for work.

"You have to be skilled. You need to have skills. Skilled carpenters, welders, truck drivers," she said.

And having a place to live helps too.

"We're telling people who have housing to put it on their resume because that's a plus," she said.

But there is one thing Williston is not short on, crime.

"Gun calls have gone up, stabbings, knives, all those kinds of calls have also been on the rise," said Detective Amy Nickoloff with the Williston Police Department.

Nickoloff is originally from Minnesota, along with almost half of the police department. It's a department that is overwhelmed. Calls for service have increased 260% in just two years.

She says they are looking to add more staff.

"It's relatively safe but obviously when you bring in an influx of people you're going to have a higher crime rate," she said.

[Steven Douglas]

Extraction taxes from oil from the Bakken and Sanish/Three Forks formations is a major source of revenue for the state, but that doesn't mean it's all being spent into the economy. In fact, most of that state revenue is going toward building enormous surpluses, most of which are not allocated for any use at all.

Despite the fact that many who were drawn to the oil fields for employment are "making it there to spend it elsewhere", there's no question that the oil boom in ND has had a ripple effect in the overall economy. What most people don't realize, however, is that much of the oil field is isolated from major population centers, and with a shortage of housing, there is a "share cropper" aspect to the oil patch, as rent-seeking developers in the Bakkans have cropped up, like Capital Lodgers [LINK], to capture a sizable portion of the personal income generated by the boom.

There is another aspect to this that most people aren't aware of, and that is that the industry is now in a drilling phase. Those are the salad days for the oil patch. That lasts for about a generation, and will eventually come to an end.

The increase in jobs and the demands upon the local area will continue throughout the drilling phase of the industry’s development, which will last for the next 15‐20 years. However, when the industry transitions from the drilling to the production phase, demand for labor in the industry will fall by 90%.

[NoOneButPaul]

ND was 1 of the 10 states voted on in the which state vote the FSP held. ND came in LAST by a good margin.

If we're going to do multiple projects we should really keep it confined to Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada for obvious reasons

It's one thing to strip one of those states of their early voting status, it's a whole other to strip all 4.

Southerners to SC, Midwesterners to Iowa, Northeasterners to NH, and Westerners to Nevada.

I certainly don't advocate this at all, NH is great, but multiple FSPs in these states would be devastating to every primary from here until they changed it.

[KCIndy]

thanks! do you know what "stage" they are at? As in, how much longer it'll last before it's either saturated with workers or oil is all sucked up?

Yes, there's always a finite number of jobs created, and that's my question, how many oil jobs can we expect to create?

Can we expect that for every 1 oil job created, there's 2 "non oil jobs" created to support the person's lifestyle?

Tpoints, as you can see from the story posted by Keith and stuff, the center of the boom is in the town of Williston. My wife and I are team truck drivers, and we go through North Dakota quite a bit. I've not had any experience directly with Williston, but even the nearby towns like Minot have been feeling the effects from this.

A couple of years ago, before the boom, a truck wash in Minot was around eighty bucks. Last time I checked, the price had more than doubled. Last time I was in the Wal-Mart in Minot, they had a display in front of the store offering a four dollar per hour bonus - bonus, mind - for anyone willing to hire on and stock shelves overnights. The restaurants were having a hard time hiring staff even at ten and twelve bucks an hour.

If you have trade skills - welding, machine tools, electrician, pipefitting, heavy equipment operations, etc you can still find some real high-paying jobs. But if you're planning on going there to look for work, be prepared to pay dearly for every amenity, and twice over for housing. Don't take the family. Be prepared for "bunkhouse living" with a bunch of other guys.... and don't plan on camping out like those poor bastards in that news story. The average low in Williston is well below zero in January:



That's just a bit too cold to be living in a tent, IMHO.

[phill4paul]

Extraction taxes from oil from the Bakken and Sanish/Three Forks formations is a major source of revenue for the state, but that doesn't mean it's all being spent into the economy. In fact, most of that state revenue is going toward building enormous surpluses, most of which are not allocated for any use at all.

Despite the fact that many who were drawn to the oil fields for employment are "making it there to spend it elsewhere", there's no question that the oil boom in ND has had a ripple effect in the overall economy. What most people don't realize, however, is that much of the oil field is isolated from major population centers, and with a shortage of housing, there is a "share cropper" aspect to the oil patch, as rent-seeking developers in the Bakkans have cropped up, like Capital Lodgers [LINK], to capture a sizable portion of the personal income generated by the boom.

There is another aspect to this that most people aren't aware of, and that is that the industry is now in a drilling phase. Those are the salad days for the oil patch. That lasts for about a generation, and will eventually come to an end.

The future will be moving slightly south to the Niobrara shelf in Colorado from what I've seen.

[phill4paul]

Tpoints check out this thread. It might answer some of your questions...

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthr...=Williston+N.D.

[Confederate]

If we're going to do multiple projects we should really keep it confined to Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Nevada for obvious reasons

New Hampshire is the only feasible one of those. Iowa is a blue state, SC and Nevada are not liberty states. If there's going to be a second FSP then it should be a relatively small (population-wise especially), red state like Montana.

[Jordan]

Well, my question actually is this : does such a boom bring in more jobs than the oil jobs themselves?

It's creating jobs in every industry because people who might otherwise work one job go to the oil industry for the money. Even McDonald's workers are getting $15/hr+ because labor is so scarce.

Why aren't we hearing about this more as a solution to unemployment? Is it because it's not there or not big enough?

We are. Fracking and mining have been perennial headlines on any business/finance publication. You're just not hearing about it in RPF all that much. There are people flocking to Australia for mining right now, too, many of them making $150K or more per year with nothing more than a high school education. There are plenty of great, high-paying, and sustainable jobs out there if you look past the macro doom and gloom story.

Surely, if it was so promising, the employers would advertise in highly unemployed areas to recruit people, right?

It's best for single dudes who can deal with crappy weather, long hours, but want to enjoy obscenely high pay. The persistent news coverage is doing a pretty good job of recruiting new employees from all over the place.

[Steven Douglas]

New Hampshire is the only feasible one of those. Iowa is a blue state, SC and Nevada are not liberty states. If there's going to be a second FSP then it should be a relatively small (population-wise especially), red state like Montana.

I agree. New Hampshire is the ultimate all around choice, and I would do anything to see it FSP efforts succeed.

[phill4paul]

Well, my question actually is this : does such a boom bring in more jobs than the oil jobs themselves?

It's creating jobs in every industry because people who might otherwise work one job go to the oil industry for the money. Even McDonald's workers are getting $15/hr+ because labor is so scarce.

Why aren't we hearing about this more as a solution to unemployment? Is it because it's not there or not big enough?

We are. Fracking and mining have been perennial headlines on any business/finance publication. You're just not hearing about it in RPF all that much. There are people flocking to Australia for mining right now, too, many of them making $150K or more per year with nothing more than a high school education. There are plenty of great, high-paying, and sustainable jobs out there if you look past the macro doom and gloom story.

Surely, if it was so promising, the employers would advertise in highly unemployed areas to recruit people, right?

It's best for single dudes who can deal with crappy weather, long hours, but want to enjoy obscenely high pay. The persistent news coverage is doing a pretty good job of recruiting new employees from all over the place.

Yes to the above. I do want to mention that the largest problem is infrastructure. Housing is a major consideration. KBR is only capable of providing so many "man camps" at the price they charge those working in the oil industry. A McD worker isn't gonna fair as well. However, depending on the company a low wage earner works for, like WalMarx, they will bring them in over the Christmas holidays paying them twice their wages and dorming them in hotel blocks.