Chiropractors On Site In The Oil Patch

The Dickinson Press is reporting:

After Las Vegas chiropractor Stephen Alexander had 65 patients relocate to North Dakota, it wasn’t long before his phone started ringing.

The men who moved to northwest North Dakota to work in the Oil Patch struggled to find chiropractors available and called “Dr. Steve” for help.

Alexander, 43, who practiced for 12 years as a chiropractic physician in Las Vegas, decided to develop a chiropractic rehab clinic on wheels. He invested $200,000 in a 57-foot RV that is customized with a digital X-ray machine, examination room and other technology.

Many, many story lines: the one that caught my attention -- 65 patients of his, from Las Vegas, relocated to the Bakken. I can't imagine every blue collar worker moving from Las Vegas to Williston needs a chiropractor, that's quite a statistic. Even if the figure is as high as 10% (which I would find hard to believe) that means as many as 650 workers from Las Vegas moved to the oil patch.

What a great time to take readers back to the IRS national relocation map. (There might be an ad first, and the link might take you through Forbes, but you will get there.) Type in Las Vegas or click on Clark County (southeast corner of Nevada). A lot of red (migration out of state). Look at the solid red from Clark County, Nevada, to Ward County (Minot), North Dakota. That data appears to be current only through 2010. If so, there has been a huge jump in folks moving from Las Vegas to the Bakken in 2011 and 2012 based on The Dickinson Press story.