One would think that plunging oil prices and the resulting mothballing (or bankruptcy) of the highest-cost domestic producers would lead to a collapse in u.s. oil production. And sure enough, if looking simply at headline data like the Baker Hughes count of active rigs in the U.S., then U.S. oil production grinding to a halt would be all but assured. However, what will actually happen, even as the highest-cost producers and those with the weakest balance sheets are taken to their local bankruptcy court, is that as Bloomberg reports, the U.S. is – paradoxically – set to pump a 42-year high amount of oil in 2015 “as drillers ignore the recent decline in price, pointing them in the opposite direction.”

Here is the surprise for all those thinking Saudi Arabia will declare a quick win when half of the U.S. shale is bankrupt and supply plunges: U.S. energy producers plan to pump more crude in 2015 as declining equipment costs and enhanced drilling techniques more than offset the collapse in oil markets, said Troy Eckard, whose Eckard Global LLC owns stakes in more than 260 North Dakota shale wells. That and the scramble to put competitors out of work, before competitors do just that to you.

On one hand oil companies are, logically, shutting down expensive production. However, in borrowing a page from the playbook of the iron ore producers who also are caught in an “AMZNian” race to the bottom, and are producing more raw materials than ever in hope of putting their competitors out of business as fast as possible, what they are also doing is shifting their focus to their most-prolific, lowest-cost fields, which means extracting more oil with fewer drilling rigs, said Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Global giant Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM)  the largest U.S. energy company, will increase oil production next year by the biggest margin since 2010. So far, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries' month-old bet that American drillers would be crushed by cratering prices has been a bust.