Posted on 05/14/2015 4:49:52 AM PDT by thackney
After 20 years in the oil business, Craig Reed, 62, is thinking about winding down his career just as a second downturn in six years rocks the industry.
Reed is part of the baby boomer generation that forms the backbone of the U.S. oil workforce and now weighs retirement as energy firms cut spending and shelve projects. That is a worrying prospect for company executives keen to keep their most experienced workers while they ride out the oil market slump.
"Between the politics and uncertainty and cost cutting, a lot of people of my age are saying that it isn't worth it anymore," says Reed who draws up engineering and construction contracts for major energy projects worldwide.
"Many of us could handle the downturn in 2008, but when the volatility comes back so quickly, and in a different form, it is difficult to take."
For him, it is maybe two more projects and then retirement beckons, with a holiday home in Maine that needs work.
The oil industry has been aware for years of a looming exodus of oil workers who joined in the 1970s in a so-called Great Crew Change.
But a sharp drop in oil prices from June to January that triggered spending cuts and limited opportunities for senior technical staff, threatens to speed up their departures.
That further complicates energy firms' balancing act as they cull thousands of field and office jobs to save cash, but try to retain seasoned scientists and engineers essential for oil exploration when prices rebound and drilling resumes.
Industry data show energy firms have cut at least 125,000 jobs worldwide since crude prices headed south from over $100 a barrel in June 2014 to as low as $40 last February.
Yet they try to keep specialist staff- technicians and oil reservoir engineers...
(Excerpt) Read more at rigzone.com ...
This reservoir engineer is comfortable in retirement. I do not miss the peaks and valleys of the industry.
Will sit out this valley and might step back in when the peak starts developing once again.
BTW, my Petroleum Engineering graduating class in ‘73 at UT was about 12.
Why do I think this is the REAL reason rich Republicans from Texas are backing Amnesty.
Hmmm
You think they want current illegal immigrants to be their senior technical staff, scientists and engineers?
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