Joined: May 2010
Posts: 868
What I
2/19/2016 at 9:41 AM
find funny is that everyone in the oil industry buys big fancy trucks, quads, campers, boats, new big houses, take trips all over the world and have a ton of debt!!
Well come look in my driveway, I have a very shiny truck that is not jacked up nor would you know I worked in the oil industry for 10 years now and been through 2 busts. I have a house in a small town that I bought before the prices went up and it looks just like every other non-farmer house in our town (farmers houses are a lot nicer and newer then almost every patch worker here). The renovations done on it in the last 6yrs are painting with ecosense paint in maybe 1 room every 2 years. My camper was bought used and it just so happens that I may end up living in it this year just to keep working at one of our companies stations around Canada. Yes I have a boat & a bike that was all bought so that after I worked a 20hr day for 21+ days and finally got 1 day off I might be able to spend some time with my family doing something fun....while I tried to keep my eyes open!
Yes there is a lot of spending on stupid items, I wish I didn't have some of the payments I have, but the toys some of us have are no different then the city workers, garbage men, hwys employees, farmers, truck drivers or any other profession. The difference between wasting money and not preparing for break up (like many do) is no one could have predicted this lasting this long. I don't care how good you are at saving and not spending, to go over 1 year with it being this slow would deplete many workers savings.
Not all industries in the oil made good money either. The industry I work in paid between $18.00 - $28.00/hr, we made the good money on o/t. Same people in the same profession outside the patch, make roughly the same. What we are finding now is that many employers will NOT hire patch workers no matter how desperate they make it sound like they are. They read oilpatch and they shred the resume because they fear as soon as the price goes up we are gone. Many guys will never go back to the patch after this down turn, but we still can't find a job other then flipping burgers (which is not below me if I had too). Patch workers are in a world of hurt right now and there is no end in sight, but we all aren't your stereotypical patch workers. Sorry for the rant, I just get tired of hearing all the typical jacked up trucks hahaha they're broke now cause they're stupid, they gave Virden STD's and all the other crap, when for some of us, we just want to provide for our families, have a good life and just would like a good career like everyone else.