Saw a program on the Canadian oil boom

Rollin in the bling bling eh

I was clearing well over 5k a week 15 years ago as a Siding/Windows installer.

Tradesmen make a killing, at least they do in Canada.

I get pissed off. I got 2 teen boys, one is an A student, one is a C, the C wants to be a trademan (good for him) and the schools are pushing him into College which he will surely struggle through, and almost certainly, never finish.


I have NO doubts he (the C student) will make way more money then his educated, college prepared and 'non-labourous' brother.

Because of the lack of people getting into trades and every tom dick and sally getting into computers and beauty school only to work call centers making $10/hr, there is a need for skilled trade workers. The population of skilled workers is aging and retiring. It's to a point now that a regular minimum wage factory job from years ago now pays better than most jobs landed by college educated graduates. Cut and weigh fish, make 15 an hour. Get out of college and land first job with a tech degree, make $10.50 an hour for Asurion and like-minded companies.

Learn to swing a hammer and it's not uncommon to make 25-35 an hour around here doing basic carpentry.

Exactly, I've got a handful of buddies still in trades and they all do well over 40 an hour. These are of course experienced guys though. Not noobies.

depends on what you do though. i went to school for tool and die/mold making and now all those jobs have moved to mexico/china.


and as for the original post, i doubt the average working guy is making anything near that much.

I'm guessing I watched the same program last night - Bruce Parry?

The scale of the operations was immense.

Oil Industry is far from average, they get paid danger pay as well. Plus most is remote locations for travel pay.

Getting 1k a day out of a Northern Alberta Oil Industry Labor job is probably fairly common. Like I said, I was making that much as a window/siding guy 15 years ago (out west as well).

EDIT- Of course mine was seasonal, 8 months a year. And we worked 16-18 hr days all summer long.

Yeah that area is just a ash crop, men from all around the world go there to work, earn big bucks, $1000/d, send say 80% back home to wife and kids to buy bigger houses while they still and fuck whores after work and go to the casino..... now thats life!

Just driving a big truck around, damn they even had light weight women doing these jobs, there is too much money to go around

Obviously the environment is getting hurt and also the native Indians are losing their way of life anad have to join these oil operations to survive

BTW - who did the Candians take the land from the native Indians if the Indians were there first..... I mean the British Empire did the same but then ended up gving peoples countries back so why do the native Indian not have their country back yet?

My brother works for a union, usually for the oil companies. They work on projects, going from job to job. Right now he's in Vegas on some kind of water pumping plant. He's been there a month; They put him up in a hotel. He makes like $200k - $300k a year, but he's rarely home.

Yeah, I've known lots of guys who make huge money. Swathing, building roads, working in the diamond mines up in NWT / Yukon, etc. These guys work like a dog for 16 hours a day, and they're stuck at camp for weeks on end, so there's absolutely nothing to do and nowhere to spend money.

Then once their rotation finished, they end up in the city with say $25,000 burning a hole in their pocket, and party like mad.

This is all you need to know about Fort Mcmurray

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYn3TUmpKO8

can't do it forever. and not uncommon to end your run with not a penny and a coke habit.

haha wow.

That's about how my $1k a day in my late 20s ended.

What's the income tax rate in Canada?

the unspoken economic stimulus plan

Oil business is big business. Very many essential and non-essential products are made from oil.

$1k/day in the oil industry IS NOT COMMON. Do not kid yourself. That is tool push/consultant wage. Most drilling rigs' Tool Push (The highest level you can reach on the crew) will make right around $1k/day. Some consultants, take for instance directional drilling hands or geologic consultants will make in that area. Some trucks who have invested into their own units will make up in this range too, but now you're looking at guys who have invested as much a a half million dollars into their own equipment which is contracted directly through the drilling companies. SOme B-pressure weldersearn in this range, but you're talking the best of the best when it comes to welding.

Step down from that and the next highest paid people you will run into are the Vac/Water truck drivers, the better field welders, rig move truckers and such. These guys will make anywhere from $400-600/day depending on the company they're working for if they are living in camp. The driller on a rig will earn this area too, he's number 2 in command.

Your average oil field worker will make between $200-350/day after living allowance is added in. Doesn't matter what positin they are in. This covers roughnecks/leasies, camp workers, the bandaids, well operators, and so forth.

Below this you'll find a lot more guys in the $150/day area. THis is where you'll find a lot of low level laborers working on service rigs, lease building, seismic jughounds, pipeline workers and stuff.

The best paid jobs are still on the drilling rigs though. This is where you find $1000/day jobs, and they are NOT dumbfuck labor jobs. You either need a high level of schooling to come in from the consultancy side, or 40 years of hardened drilling experience to work your way up to Tool Push, which ironically, doesn't push a single god damn tool at all.

I grew up in Alberta, dead center in Canada's richest oil fields. Every 18 year odl kid who graduates and doesn't go straight to college runs straight into the oil field, because your average high school graduate can go straight into a $6k/month job with zero work experience. This is where they get trapped with no education when the oil business is good. The oil business does NOT stay good though, and when it goes down, everyone is out of a job. People go broke and don't know what the fuck to do with themselves. They've saddled themselves with huge debts buying all the fanciest toys they can, and they they are debt slaves. I can't twll you how many friends I had 5 years ago with $350k houses, $60k new trucks, $10k on a new quad. $15/k on a new sled. $3000 worth the payments a month, who suddenly had no job, no income, no fuck all, because the oilfield took a giant dive in the market. Now what do you do with yourself?

I worked one winter swamping on a self contained semi-vac unit cleaning sand from oil tanks. and made around $200/day. It was an alright job, long hours, worked every single day. Not overly dangerous but still had it's rough spots. I slipped on a slick lease carrying a stinger amr and ruptured a disc in my lower back.

This is why oilfield workers get paid so well. Injury is lurking around every corner. The second factor for the high pay is isolation. The following winter I worked in the North American Oil Sands Corporation's Leismer field as a roughneck on a double rig. In that 5 month period I lived in a small work camp which was basically like a small comfortable prison. I took a steam burn over half my face, nearly broke my leg, pinched and slammed my arms and hands several times. One night during a cementing a safety line blew out on the pump line, it kicked to the side and took me out and the legs as I walked up the stairs to the drilling deck. It knocked me clear off the deck and about 15-20 feet to the ground below.

You also need to realize that most oil field jobs only go for a few months of the year. You make fat cash for 3-4 months, and then sit on unemployment checks the rest of the year, which isn't exactly ballin. Most riggers are shit broke within 2 months of spring breakup. You want to see a raging coke party? GO to any small town prairie bar right after breakup hits. All the raging riggers are free to run wild with $50k bankrolls.
I'd seen guys entire body's burnt by steaming hot muskeg they've sank into below steam lines. One day I was in the camp cafeteria and saw a guy come in with his face literally burned off. His mixed burped and shot a fresh load of caustic soda into his face. Many of my old friends work on the rigs, many of the don't have all their fingers left. If you asked me to list all the people I know who are missing limbs from working in the poilfield, I couldn't count them all on my fingers and toes, and I would forget half of them.

You never stop for the weather either. If it is -52 degrees celsius, the wind is blowing 80km/hour in the dark on your graveyard shift, and you're frozen, covered in mud from head to toe. TOUGH FUCKING LUCK. Drill baby drill. This is why you are well paid to drill for oil, and this is why people shit their pants when they fill up at the pump.

The pay rate may sound glamorous to some, but it's not all it is cracked up to be, and it ruins many many people in the process.

the jew knows .....

Yeah I don't think anyone is making 1k a day as a unskilled doofus, but it's not that uncommon for skilled tradesmen, not uncommon at all.

$1k/day is pretty high for any tradesman who doesn't own his own business, but there are guys up there. $45/hour is not uncommon for a lot of journeymen trade workers in the patch. Some make a little more than that in the get into the right company up north. Electricians, heavy duty mechanics, and welders seem to have the big oilfield jobs. I know a lot of those guys who are just reaching journeyman level now at my age, and plenty of them are up above $40/hour. Most that aren't running their own businesses make in that $500/day area after taxes. Once you're up making $50-60/hour your paychecks are just getting eaten alive y taxes anyhow. Equipment operators earn in the same range, and don't require the schooling. they just gotta be a little lucky to work your way into a machine.

As with anything, the key to real success is to bust as for a few years, save, invest into your own business, and be your own boss. Me and my brother were looking at investing into a Power Tong truck when we were both working on the rigs. $40/k each and we would have been able to double shift the trucks and make upwards of $6k/day between us. A lot of younger guys in our area got rich doing exactly that. We were late to the party though and lucky we didn't invest in it. the next year the field dried up, and a lot of the guys who got in when we were planning on it wound up bankrupt when their brand new tong trucks weren't moving.

Are most tradesmen up there employed by the companies or subcontractors?

I shit my pants when I watch Fubar 2. That is LITERALLY a crash course in Fort CrackMurray....

I'd say most are just workers for the big companies. NAOSC, Syncrude, these companies employ huge work forces up north. There are subcontractors, but even they are big companies and they majority of their workforce is just hired labor too. A lot of the little guys you find subcontracting are on the trucking and welding ends of things in the oil field, and even there they are often subcontracted under another contractor, and are just leasing their own equipment out and getting a bonus fee for the daily contract on their trucks and tools. A guy with his own truck can make good money, well over $1k/day...

Take the tong truck example for instance. A tong truck makes approx $1500/call. On good days you can get as many as 3-4 calls in. Depends entirely on well depth, and proximity between leases you get called to. A shallow well you can run all the casing pipe down in under an hour and walk away with $1500. Get yourself in a nice area where they are drilling shallow wells close together, and you can really rack up the bucks...

You don't want to go to Northern Alberta.

They are paid this because it is a shit existence in a place that is extremely cold 7 months of the year and bug filled sweltering hot for the rest.

Most people don't even understand what work really is - 16 days on, 3 off, 14 hour shifts.

Most of your pay will be eaten by simply affording to live there - the population boom has increased rent in some cases by +1000%, most live in army style barracks as there is no housing available.

I had a friend who hacked it for two years there, came back with some decent money and zero skills beyond working in an oil field.

That sounds about right. The smart ones go in head first when they are young, uild a big bankroll, save their money, and either buy into their own business, or get the fuck out with a ton of money to set up for life. The dumb ones get stuck for life.

A few years back as a construction contractor you could see this on job sites. The oilfield got real bad a few years back. A huge portion of the 18-35 year old male population was employed in the patch. It had been almost a solid 10 year run since the last bad dip. So people had been ballin out all rigga-rich and lived wild with a bunch of money. 10 years meant a lot of those guys worked rigs straight out of high school and never had another job.

When all these guys were out of a jo, they went into the trades. Work sites were flooded with new workers who "hung drywall for while" or "had framing experience" etc etc. Reality was they were just a bunch of dumb riggers with no other applicable skills besides getting hammered and standing around awaiting injury. Qaulity of work on new homes was a joke for a while.

this is what most of the posters in here failed to see, "Most of your pay will be eaten by simply affording to live there "

lots of good info in this thread man, i appreciate hearing it from someone who has seen it first hand.

Fort Mac, last I heard a little two bedroom apartment was upwards of $1500/month. Never mind what you'll pay to buy a home there. This isn't applicable to the entire oilfield though. There is a huge portion of the patch which is basically nomadic living in the camps for winter drilling rush. These guys get paid well. The part you're missing here is the daily living allowance. Your LOA can be as much as $150/day out on the road when you're drilling. The government can't legally tax LOA either. This is one of the big bonuses of the job. Smart people pocket tons of cash off Living Allowance when they're on the road or shipped out to the bush. When you live in camp, you are fed like a fucking king. All your needs are cared for. It's just some cabin fever inducing "barracks" type environments as someone else mentioned. It's like a little isolated prison in the boondocks.

I always joked that the government should whore out prisoners to the rigs in the Hellman fields to help lower our taxes. What are they going to do? Run away? Good luck! You'll freeze and die in the middle of nowhere before you ever escape camp.

I'd vote for you if you ran for PM

Trust me, people would not like the Jew Cat's vision of Canada. I am all for splitting the country up. I don't think a country covering such a diverse geographic range can adequately govern over such a wide variety of needs. I think BC/AB/SK should hit splitsville. Yukon and NWT can jump in with us if they want. Their resources could come in handy. Quebec, you can GTFO too. Let the Maritimes do their thing, newfies are welcome over if they'd like, and Ontario can just keep doing what it does now. They can have Manitoba and Nunavit if they really want them. Make them an open union of Canadian nations with a shared currency, and open travel/trade for those within the union. Western Seperation FTW, I really don't care what the rest of you provinces do.

I'm going to get baked and watch Fubar 2 now...

lol plenty of ex-cons and people on the run anyway.

Those guys are hiding out in the mountains and along the coast picking mushrooms. Trust me you'll meet some scary and/or very weird motherfuckers hiding out in mushroom camps...