Benchmark oil prices fell below $30 a barrel Friday, down from above $100 just two years ago. So far, that decline has wrought thousands of layoffs and foreclosures — and threatens to do even more damage over the next year.
“It’s very much a regional effect,” said Robert Gilmer, director of the Institute for Regional Forecasting at the University of Houston’s Bauer College of Business. “It primarily hits places like Texas and North Dakota.”
That’s because the oil drilled in shale formations like North Dakota’s Bakken or Texas’ Eagle Ford is relatively expensive.