Word: bbl
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...question is how hard the oil shock will strike an economy that is already staggering. So far, crude-oil prices, which closed at $26.23 per bbl. last week, have jumped about 40% in recent weeks. For the moment, that is far less than the price hikes of the 1970s, which reached more than 300%. Those oil shocks gave rise to the dread combination of high unemployment and double- digit inflation, which became known as stagflation...
...even the current oil run-up could have a substantial and damaging effect on the way Americans work, shop and spend their leisure time. Every $1-per- bbl. increase in the cost of crude oil acts like a tax to siphon income from consumers and companies. Laurence Meyer, a Washington University economist who runs his own forecasting firm in St. Louis, had predicted a recession even before the oil shock. If prices charged by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries reach $30 per bbl. in the fourth quarter, Meyer says, the GNP would decline a painful 3.6% during the period...
Nowhere is the potential upswing in financial fortunes more dramatic than in Texas. In the late '70s, when oil reached $34 per bbl., Northerners fumed while Energy Belt entrepreneurs got rich. The decline of oil prices and the collapse of inflated real estate values culminated in the 1986 crash that battered the state economy. Even though Texas is diversifying to lessen its dependence on oil production, the state could benefit once again from high- cost fuel. In new revenues alone, each $1-per-bbl. increase would bring $50 million into state coffers. Stephen Brown, a senior economist for the Federal...
...such as offshore oil and coal. Second and more important, any effort to wean the U.S. from foreign energy sources would require forcing consumers to pay a higher price for gasoline and other fuels. In the early 1980s, when the price of crude rose to more than $40 per bbl., imports fell by half. But as prices slumped to as low as $10 per bbl., consumption and imports leaped to new highs. Says Richard Rippe, chief economist of Dean Witter: "We were far too complacent about letting the current price tell us where energy policy should...
...shocks of 1973 and 1979 less likely. Price controls that distorted energy markets have been lifted, and most of the restrictions that made it difficult for industries to shift to whatever fuel is cheapest have been removed. Most vital is the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, 590 million bbl. of crude that the government has been stashing away in salt domes in Louisiana and Texas since 1977. Though the reserve is designed to combat shortages that might arise during a crisis, some members of Congress and many energy economists are pushing the Administration to announce that it would be willing to release...