re: Why dont Oil Field Workers have savings accounts ?

Because buying things is more fun than not buying things. Unfortunately, they can't predict the market and futures as well as you.

I'd also suspect that a lot of them were prepared, but are still freaked out that they lost their jobs and haven't ever seen money flow out of their accounts that fast

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All I am trying to do is suggest a way to keep people from being homeless and hungry.

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I'm not aware of one single person we've had to let go that's homeless and hungry

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I'm pretty good with my money and I would be hurting with a year of no income.

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That's my point. Even when the price of oil rebounds, companies are not going to be looking to hire right out of the gate and will be hesitant for a while.

Sure, it's easy to say that they can look for other work, but most of these layoffs are happening in communities like Lafayette and Houma where there are a couple thousand people looking for jobs with a similar skill set. There aren't that many jobs to go around. Sure, they could move to a different location for work, but now you are talking about putting a house up for sale and likely taking a substantial loss on your house because those real estate markets are heavily favoring buyers right now.

My point is, it's easy to say that they should have just saved, but the reality is that even those that saved would still be in financial trouble.