Life in the Oil Patch -- Excellent Reporting -- Also: Two More Man-Camps in Dickinson -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

From the oil patch:

"I'm making more now than I would've if I would've gone to college," Austin says. As the sun sets behind him, the sky turns a hazy pink.

"I was going to go to school for alternative energy - and here I am in the oil field.

"So much for solar panels."

Ah, yes, solar energy. The link to the story from which the above quote comes from is here.

The lede:

WILLISTON, N.D. -- You can almost smell the opportunity along Highway 2. It oozes deep from the sloping North Dakota prairie where oil derricks and natural gas wells sprout among the drying rolls of hay.

People come here hopeful, drawn by the promise of jobs. But they probably also utter a few prayers, or expletives, when they realize just how far from home this place really is.

Or when they see the makeshift villages of narrow metal-sided buildings rising from the plains - temporary housing to accommodate what many are calling the largest oil boom in recent North American history.

Read the story; full of great quotes and observations from the West.

Also, two more man-camps in Dickinson, North Dakota.

Crude-by-Rail Hub -- Dickinson -- North Dakota -- Soon To Be Completed -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

Link here (regional links break early and break often).

A 300-acre rail hub near Dickinson will begin operating at the end of the month, according to Wichita, Kan.-based Lario Logistics LLC, which owns the facility.

Bakken Oil Express LLC will receive crude oil from the Bakken and Three Forks formations via pipelines and trucks. The oil will then be loaded into unit trains for further transportation to out of state markets, said Gerald O’Shaughnessy, chairman of Lario Logistics and BOE.

“In October we’ll accept more oil and by the end of October the project will be completed and we’ll be able to accept as much as the facility capacity at that point, which is 100,000 barrels a day,” he said.

The facility is located west of Dickinson on 115th Street Southwest and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe mainline.

Net US Jobs Added Last Month: Zero. Nada. Zilch.

Link here.

The US economy created no jobs and the unemployment rate held steadily higher at 9.1 percent in August, fueling concerns that the US is heading for another recession.

It was the first time since World War II that the economy had a net zero jobs created for a month.

Drudge called it the bleakest report in 12 months.

I can hardly wait for the next jobs program speech. I'm being serious. It will be an opportunity for a break just before the NFL football season opener.

By the way, even NASCAR has scheduling conflicts; more than half the field will be unable to attend the president's invitation "for a photo op" due to their own scheduling conflicts. I can't make this stuff up.

National Economy -- Not a Bakken Story -- For Folks Interested Only in the Bakken Skip This Post -- This Is For My Personal Archives

First time jobless claims: 409,000. For newbies, the critical milestone is 400,000.
The figure remains higher than it was three weeks earlier, before the labor dispute at Verizon pushed the numbers up.

US productivity declined at an annual rate of 0.7 percent in 2nd quarter, a bigger drop than the 0.3 percent decline reported a month ago.

They argue that the economy can tolerate a brief period of weaker productivity growth if it means that companies have reached the limit on the amount of work they can squeeze out of the existing work force and begin hiring back the millions of workers laid off during the recession. That would boost income growth and result in stronger consumer demand which they hope will drive the economy to a faster expansion.

During the recession and immediately afterward, productivity soared with worker efficiency rising at an annual rate of 4.1 percent last year, the strongest performance in eight years. Economists at JPMorgan Chase are forecasting that productivity this year will grow by just 0.7 percent.

It's now the Obama economy. 

Only a third of all Americans approve of how President Barack Obama is handling the economy, according to a new national survey.

Let's See? What Else Can the Federal Government Do to Slow The Economy? -- Not a Bakken Story

So far, and these are just the big ones that come to mind:

Permitorium in the Gulf.

Suing to stop Boeing's new plant in South Carolina.

Suing to stop ATT from buying T-Mobile.

Slow-rolling the Keystone XL pipeline.

Now today, it is being reported that the government will sue "the big banks" for housing mortgage misrepresentation.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency suits, which are expected to be filed in the coming days in federal court, are aimed at Bank of America,  JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and Deutsche Bank, among others, according to three individuals briefed on the matter. 

No wonder the banks are not lending money. It should be noted that the rules for lending going forward are more stringent / onerous than the ones under which these banks loaned money before the housing debacle. 

For investors, Jim Cramer says "never" invest in airlines. I think he is about ready to add "big banks" to that list. The timing of this story is interesting. Warren Buffett just made a huge investment in Bank of America. He could have waited a few days and got an even better deal.

Unrelated, I did post an op-ed on electric cars. 

Oh, well, we'll see the jobs report later this morning and that will cheer everyone up.

Meanwhile, I'm waiting for the Bakken day to begin. Good luck to all. And have a great three-day weekend.