North Dakota population estimates

[ebitdadada]

Originally Posted by BreaOC

Awesome work with the numbers. I like figuring things like that too, and have though about situations like this where you have a state with a generally low population with two areas that make up the majority of that population. Did you figure in the people from migrating from other states to ND into that as well? Bismarck and Fargo have a percentage of their growth coming from out of state, although it is safe to figure a lot of their growth come from the rural areas of the state.

Really all I did for the projections was take the % change over the most recent annual period & project it forward for Bis-Man (Burliegh + Morton), Cass County, & the State Ex Bis-Man & Cass County. So not all that scientific . I did that more for fun than anything else. The really interesting thing was actually looking @ Bismarck-Mandan & how the growth rate basically doubled in the middle of the decade and then kept increasing.

[ebitdadada]

Originally Posted by chester

So, the influx of new people into Bismarck is not because of the price of oil. That is all I was saying.

I think you're underestimating the impact the price of oil has on Bismarck: Yes the rough, manual labor jobs are all out in Williston but a good portion of the brains behind ND's energy industry reside in Bismarck: Its not just about oil companies, its also about the technical services firms, the energy traders and the accounting firms too. The people that work for those firms can live anywhere they want and probably don't care to live in Williston or Minot. Most of them don't.

Additionally, there's a little energy company (soon to be fortune 500) called MDU Resources that happens have its headquarters in Bismarck. A very major portion of MDU's profit comes from pumping Gulf oil & transportiong Williston Basin Oil. High oil prices also drive the price of coal higher.

Finally, wherever and however a dollar is made in western ND, a portion of it will end up in Bismarck. Those oil workers arn't spending all of their cash in Williston...

I'll agree with you that there are pleanty of other reasons Bis-Man is growing but the price of oil is still a big one.

[bismanpokerclub]

Originally Posted by ebitdadada

I think you're underestimating the impact the price of oil has on Bismarck: Yes the rough, manual labor jobs are all out in Williston but a good portion of the brains behind ND's energy industry reside in Bismarck: Its not just about oil companies, its also about the technical services firms, the energy traders and the accounting firms too. The people that work for those firms can live anywhere they want and probably don't care to live in Williston or Minot. Most of them don't.

Additionally, there's a little energy company (soon to be fortune 500) called MDU Resources that happens have its headquarters in Bismarck. A very major portion of MDU's profit comes from pumping Gulf oil & transportiong Williston Basin Oil. High oil prices also drive the price of coal higher.

Finally, wherever and however a dollar is made in western ND, a portion of it will end up in Bismarck. Those oil workers arn't spending all of their cash in Williston...

I'll agree with you that there are pleanty of other reasons Bis-Man is growing but the price of oil is still a big one.

Yes, I know a few people that have worked at the refinery over the years too, and they have NOT stayed at the same # of employees since the 1950's, there numbers have gone up and down like most companies and they are at the point where they have as many employees as they can have for the size of the refinery, which may be growing, as a couple of weeks ago a friend told me they were going to be shutting down for a while, I didn't have a lot of time to talk to him and I had assumed it was probably to do some work on a bit of expanding. Also as you said there are a lot of people who choose to live in Bismarck and work away from Bismarck, I have several people who play in my poker game that either work for the oil companies or work for the coal mines, neither one of those jobs is in Burleigh/Morton counties. There are also a lot of Job fairs in Bismarck that these companies help put on in Bismarck with Job Service. To say Bismarck/Mandan and its population is not affected by the oil companies is absurd.

[chester]

Ahhh...sorry for hitting a raw nerve with some of you. My opinion was just that, an opinion. Yours is an opinion also, based on what you are reading into the census bureau estimates and oil prices. I still don't think Bismarcks growth is related to the oil industry. I do not think Bismarck is the "brain" behind the oil growth in western ND. Most of the brain comes from the oil companies themselves, which have their own investors, chemists, geologists, etc... based in the cities that house their headquarters. The brains would be in places like Houston, Dallas, Denver, Oklahmo City, etc... not that Bismarck doesn't have some. But Bismarck is not the big player and brains behind the oil boom going on. Sorry. I do believe the refinery will need to expand to handle the increase production...otherwise it will leave the state and be refined elsewhere. If Tesero is planning on an expansion, I'm sure they are trying to stay ahead of the planned refineries in both Parshall-Makot and Williston. As a resident of Bismarck, I am all for the refinery of Mandan expanding. This is one way the Bismarck-Mandan area can benefit from the boom taking place in western ND.