Saturday, May 12, 2012

Jesse Kelly Just Making Stuff Up as He Goes Along

Posted By on Sat, May 12, 2012 at 12:00 PM

The audio on the above clip is faint, but Jesse Kelly has been using an anecdote about the power of oil to power the economy:

I think energy's the way forward in this nation. We talk about gas prices, jobs, and all these other things. Two million oil jobs alone are sitting out there. And a lot of you, I'm not in the oil field, that doesn't benefit me directly, but you know there are McDonald's in this country that are paying $25 an hour to work at McDonald's? They're around the oil fields.

While I can't dispute that there's money in oil, if you're heading out to oil country to get a fry cook job at $52,800 a year, don't bother. The most likely source of Kelly's wrong information are a stream of news reports about the oil boom in Williston, North Dakota, which is certainly undergoing a rapid influx of cash, leading to stories with lines like this:

The McDonald's in Williston is one of the busiest in the country, and it needs to pay $15 an hour just to attract employees.

$15? $25? That's a mistake that could be made, sure. However, all anyone has to do is head to the McDonald's hiring website, which conveniently informs potential applicants what they might make as a new hire...and all the positions at the Williston McDonald's start at $9.00. Not bad as it goes, I suppose, but a far, far cry from $25/hour. Maybe you can find an actual, verifiable listing for an oil-rich McDonald's that pays that much. I spent an hour looking and the fine people of McDonald's chose not to return my email or phone call, for what it's worth.

Then again, what difference does it make? Kelly has already established he has a loose relationship with reality regarding oil. The story sounds way better the way Kelly tells it, plus life is probably better at the top of the magical beanstalk.

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