This country no longer possesses the quantity of cheap oil needed to sustain it at the levels of prosperity to which we are accustomed.
To say otherwise belies the state of our resources.
It will be generations until such time we can wean ourselves from hydrocarbons, no matter how much Trump says otherwise.
In the meantime, we must continue to access foreign sources of crude and begin seriously to develop synthetic oil out of natural gas and coal, which we have aplenty.
I have been intimately involved in the domestic and foreign oil industry for over 50 years, and tasked with keeping up with worldwide resources.
Aging 'shale' fields tend to produce more gas as they age, in relation to the amount of oil. We are already seeing an increase in natural gas production in the Williston Basin (mainly Bakken/Three Forks).
The only way to sustain oil production, especially considering initial decline curves (about 80% decline from initial production in the first two years, leveling off afterwards to a much slower decline rate), is to keep drilling. That requires, despite advancements in oil tools and techniques, about $60/bbl oil to keep up.
There are limits to how efficient the process can be, and the people who do it aren't making huge money, just into six figures for 12 hour workdays, unpredictable schedules, and less than optimal working conditions. Considering secretaries on the coasts are making 80K to work in climate controlled environments for eight hours a day where the commute is more dangerous than the job and they get home every night, there is a point where these specialized and highly trained folks just won't leave the house. You can't expect more productivity, more precision, and cut pay (although a lot of benefits have already been slashed).
Savings by changing methodology have their limits, too. While 2 mile laterals were the norm, three and four mile horizontal wellbores are becoming more common, and I expect will become the 'new normal' where lease spacing permits. It allows twice the producing exposure of formations for the same costs in intermediate casing and cuts the 24 hours it takes to move the rig by half for the amount of producing formation exposure. A caveat: after three miles of lateral the incidence of going out of the target zone increases, and that necessitates pulling back and sidetracking the wellbore back into the target, which can take a minimum of 24 hours of rig time, and causes the effective loss of up to a mile of wellbore. It's a gamble, in that sense, putting a lot more on the folks geosteering the well, and if it pays off, fine. If not, it can cost as much as drilling two laterals, and we haven't even mentioned the other engineering complications that can accompany that longer wellbore.
I don't expect that onshore horizontal wells will drill our way to cheap oil, without leading to another bust/boom cycle with the usual price fluctuations. (Cheap gas today, followed by high prices later as oil falls into shorter supply and prices surge).
The bottom line is that I don't see oil getting cheaper without some sort of major fiscal reset causing the dollar to be worth much more, but that motor fuels will be likely to consume a similar fraction of your budget to what they do today.
Beyond that, changing vehicles might be the only way to save.
I've been visiting relatives and getting some doctoring done back East, and the rental I'm driving gets three miles for the same amount of fuel my Suburban does back home (not that the car I'm driving here would get around where I need to back there).
FWIW, my pay rate (day rate) is still the same dollar amount it was 10 years ago, so consider Bidenflation gave me a 20% pay cut.
