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Should Washington Lift the Ban on Crude Oil Exports?

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Learn more about William McKenzie.
William McKenzie
Senior Editorial Advisor
George W. Bush Institute

It’s hard not to pick up a paper today and read about America’s energy boom, whether from shale gas or crude oil.As one example of the...

It’s hard not to pick up a paper today and read about America’s energy boom, whether from shale gas or crude oil.

As one example of the boom, U.S. crude oil production is projected to hit about 10 million barrels a day by the middle of this decade. That would be up from about 6.5 million barrels a day last year.

With such production going on, some producers would like to see the U.S. lift the ban Washington put on exporting our crude oil. That ban came in response to the Arab oil embargo of 1973, when Mideast producers cut off supplies to the U.S. and Europe.

In this video, Bernard Weinstein, a fellow in economics at the Bush Institute and associate director of the Maguire Energy Institute at Southern Methodist University, talks about this possible policy shift. Weinstein also is an adjunct professor of business economics in the Cox School of Business at SMU.