http://www.southernstudies.org/2010/09/the-gulf-offshore-drilling-jobs-hoax.html
When the Interior Department announced a six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling in the wake of the BP disaster, the energy industry and conservatives rushed to declare that the Obama administration was bent on destroying the Gulf Coast economy.
For example, in a July report for the American Energy Alliance — which the media innocently described as a “non-profit organization based in Washington, D.C.,” but in reality is an oil company-funded front group — Prof. Joe Mason of Louisiana State University warned that 8,000 jobs and $500 million in wages would be lost, with total economic damages amounting to some $2.1 billion.
The warnings of impending doom had their desired affect: Louisiana lawmakers and the public rose to denounce the moratorium. Judge Martin Feldman from the Eastern District of New Orleans — a Reagan appointee with his own heavy investments in energy — based his June opinion [pdf] batting down the moratorium on fears that “an estimated 150,000 jobs are directly related to offshore operations” and even a short-term ban would cause “irreparable harm” to the economy.
In the highly-charged partisan debate, everyone was forced to get on board. Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal, in his amicus brief [pdf] opposing the moratorium, even got the Louisiana Workforce Commission — the agency in charge of administering unemployment claims — to go on record saying that:
Because of the moratorium, many thousands of Louisiana workers have lost their employment and many more are at risk of losing it in the near future. All of the programs administered by LWC have been and will be heavily impacted by its effects.
But there was one problem: The claims weren’t true. The economic disaster never materialized. The evidence is clear:
* Despite early reports that 33 rigs would likely pull up stakes from the Gulf after the moratorium, a New Orleans Times Picayune report on August 11 found that “only two of 33 deepwater rigs in the Gulf have left for foreign oilfields.”
* The Times Picayune also found that “the predictions of tens of thousands of lost jobs across the region have yet to materialize.” In fact:
[W]eekly unemployment claims data in the mining industry sector, which comprises primarily oil- and gas-related jobs, have shown no noticeable spike since the moratorium was declared May 28. Overall employment data in coastal parishes also show little change since the drilling ban.
* In fact, on the oil rigs affected by the moratorium, the paper found “there have been no reported layoffs.”
The Louisiana Workforce Commission’s politicized claims have proved to be especially egregious. In reality, their weekly press release since the moratorium have gone into effect have shown a steady decrease in unemployment claims across the state. The latest report, from September 10, showed a decline in initial claims from 4,120 to 4,083. Claims similarly declined in June, July and August.
Indeed, in the Commissions’ eagerness to show the wisdom of the governor’s economic agenda, they couldn’t help but contradict their claims of moratorium-induced calamity with this sunny dispatch on August 20, titled “Louisiana Labor Force Hits Record High for July:”
The state’s July unemployment rate was tied for 14th lowest in the nation and was the fourth lowest in the Southern region. The Southern region rate for July was 9.2 percent.
As in the case of Prof. Mason’s research-for-hire, the original source of the bogus claims of economic collapse are easy enough to trace: The energy industry itself, and by extension the Louisiana politicians they fund.
As Louisiana Democratic blogger Mike Stagg points out, one of the first warnings of gloom and doom came from Edison Chouest Offshore, a Port Fourchon-based company which threatened “mass layoffs” of “as many as 1,000 workers” in the wake of the moratorium. Edison Chouest hosted the first anti-moratorium rally in Louisiana on June 10, which Gov. Jindal himself attended. The second rally on June 24 was at Gulf Island Fabricators offices in Houma, La. — the same company which is building an Edison Chouest facility (with the help of state funds).
Edison Chouest also happens to be one of the biggest power players in Louisiana politics. For example:
* Edison Chouest is the second-largest contributor to Sen. David Vitter (R), according to OpenSecrets.org. And that doesn’t include Gary Chouest’s personal $100,000 investment in Vitter’s Louisiana Committee for a Republican Majority in 2006.
* Edison Chouest is also ranks among the top four contributors to Sen. Mary Landrieu (D).
* Edison Chouest is the top contributor to the campaigns of Rep. Bill Cassidy (R-6th) and Rep. Joseph Cao (R-2nd), and among the top five contributors to Rep. Steve Scalise (R-1st) and Rep. Charles Boustany (R-7th).
Perhaps this has something to do with why nearly all of Louisiana’s politicians came out forcefully opposing the drilling moratorium, believing the energy industry executives as opposed to the real facts on the ground of the Gulf oil jobs hoax.
By Chris Kromm on September 14, 2010 11:00 AM
Special thanks to Richard Charter, as always!
