Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Comment of the day: some reality-based numbers on casinos

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With the big news of the last few days being what is going to happen with the expanded gambling legislation currently sitting on the Governor’s desk, I thought MiddleboroReview’s excellent comment digging up some actual numbers – rather than wild estimates – about the number and types of jobs that can be expected from expanded gambling was highly relevant.

Maybe candor is required

The Casino Cheerleaders have relentlessly repeated the false  buzzwords so that most folks accept and believe them with little consideration.

From What’s the big hurry? written by Scott Harshbarger and Michael Dukakis:

The number of jobs the proposed legislation would create has been wildly exaggerated. We are told that two casinos and four racinos will net about 16,000 construction and permanent jobs. But in Indiana it takes 10 riverboats, one casino and two racinos to generate 16,000 current jobs and Louisiana requires 18 casinos to employ 17,268, according to the American Gaming Association.

Michigan’s three casinos net 8,568 permanent jobs and New Mexico’s five racinos employ less than 2,000 people.

In Las Vegas, it takes 266 casinos to bring in $11.6 billion in gross revenue, which translates into $924 million in tax revenue. Even the $300 million to $600 million now estimated here is a stretch based on that data.

We need good jobs that provide a future, that we can be proud to work.

Slot Barns provide low wage dead end jobs.

The unions brought 3 members from Atlantic City to testify at the Senate Ways & Means Committee Hearing. They spoke of the great benefits derived from union membership and wonderful wages.

One Senator listened quietly and finally asked what the starting pay was.

The panel looked like deer in the headlights!

They sputtered and hesitated until finally one panelist indicated the starting pay was ABOUT $10 an hour.

From my testimony, Beacon Hill Testimony: Where is your proof?:

Sands Bethlehem Casino Resort is building a

300 room hotel whose construction will employ

350 people.

Ball State University:

…found the average annual salary of a racino employee is less than $14,000. This was near minimum wage at the time of the study.

From Recent Study Examines Poverty in Atlantic City that’s worth reading in its entirety:

The round-the-clock nature of casino work, coupled with a lack of enough safe, affordable child care, affects the ability of employees with children, particularly single parents, to maintain their jobs. Finally, the low-skill service jobs available in casinos or other industries may not provide enough income to escape poverty. Residents often noted that they or someone they knew held two or three casino jobs in order to make ends meet.

One of the most striking quotes is here: Race to the bottom….

Las Vegas’ crime rate is 1,040 percent higher than Branson’s and 15.7 times higher than Bloomington’s, Grinols reported, although both destinations draw far more visitors per resident than does Las Vegas.

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Comments

  1. is the state lottery. Too many people are completely ignoring what slot machines would do to the state lottery which, like it or not, this state depends on at this point.

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    p>

    In Las Vegas, it takes 266 casinos to bring in $11.6 billion in gross revenue, which translates into $924 million in tax revenue.

    <

    p>The state lottery of Massachusetts brings in more revenue than Las Vegas’s 266 casinos. If it takes a 10% hit — which is a fairly conservative number — it will be very difficult for the state to bring in enough slot tax revenue to offset the 100 million we’d lose to the state lottery.

    <

    p>IMO, it’s impossible to break even with the state lottery losses after you take into consideration the hundreds of millions that would have to go into a Gaming Commission, extra personnel for the State Police and Attorney General’s Office (to the tune hundreds of employees, if NJ is any indication), and mitigation expenses for local communities. This is what Dan Bosley’s been screaming about for years, though he’s been largely ignored. We don’t make any money from this, period.

    <

    p>So, when proponents say, “well, we allow the state lottery, why shouldn’t we allow casinos?” tell them it’s a bit more complicated than that. Barring a solution that would prevent the state lottery from being cannibalized, or would tax slot machines at a rate similar to that of the state lottery, no one should be able to use the state lottery as a defense of supporting slots when it’s one of the biggest examples of why we can’t afford slots in Massachusetts to begin with.  

  2. I live in a city that is proposed as the site of a new casino and I oppose it.  As is evident in this post and others articles, the Commonwealth will be a big looser if we allow “slot barns.”  (I love that term so much)  The only winner could be somebody’s in-law that gets a hack government job.  Now if we could weenie our government off of the lottery starting with Keno.  These are the worst regressive taxes.

    • The Gambling Industry is extremely profitable, conducts polling, marketing and focus groups to determine effective terms to use.

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      p>”Ahh…let’s try GAMING instead of Gambling. let’s try “Regional Entertainment Facility [ssshhhh! that just happens to have gazillion slot machines]” and so it goes.

      <

      p>The best marketing money can buy!

      <

      p>But it’s still a SLOT BARN and that’s all you’re gonna get!

      <

      p>There’s a map here: Massachusetts: Proposed Gaming Locations

      <

      p>Gladys has suggested we locate one in Richmond, the Governor’s home. I second that!  

      • Industry refers to the production of an economic good (either material or a service) within an economy. –  Wikipedia

        <

        p>”The Cocaine Industry is extremely profitable, conducts polling, marketing and focus groups to determine effective terms to use.”

        <

        p>Why doesn’t that sound right? Perhaps the cocaine industry is lacking sufficient polling, marketing, and focus groups. What they need is a friendly spokesperson and well connected lobbyists with the nerve to call it an industry with a straight face.

  3. What a pity!

    <

    p>Each of the phony claims being promoted by Casino Cheerleaders can be easily disproven.

    <

    p>Pretty sad that folks are so easily led.

    <

    p>The Spectrum Report, updated for the Speaker in March 2010 for unknown costs, projected revenues based on a 2 hour drive time.

    <

    p>This is from our friends up north where the best the Industry can come up with is “Tourism” —

    <

    p>Casinos: Limited Tourism Benefit

    <

    p>

    Here is data from several studies disproving any claim that video slots casinos will enhance New Hampshire tourism.

    · 95 percent of patrons at the Bangor, Maine casino live within 35-50 miles. 97 percent live in Maine. (Maine Public Broadcasting Network, Interview with Mike Peters, April 13, 2007).

    · A survey of Illinois riverboat gamblers conducted in 1995 found that 85 percent lived within 50 miles of the floating casino at which they were gambling.1

    · A study by Iowa State University reported that 94 percent of gamblers at the Prairie Meadows Race Track and Casino in Des Moines came from within the state; nearly two-thirds came from the county in which the racetrack is located.2

    · A survey of gamblers inside a Kansas City, Missouri, casino found that 88 percent lived within 45 minutes of the casino.3 Another survey of Kansas City casinos, which are located on or near the Missouri River across from the Kansas border, found that 94 percent of cars in the casino parking lots bore either Missouri or Kansas license plates.4

    · Eighty percent of Wisconsin casino revenues come from Wisconsin residents, according to a study released in 1995.5

    · The 1995 United States Survey of Gaming and Gambling gives further evidence that casinos are primarily a local draw. The survey found that among respondents with a casino in or near their community, 40 percent gambled in the past year, compared to only 17 percent of those who lived at least 100 miles from a casino. Further, among casino gamblers, 42 percent of those with a casino in or near their community gambled at least every three months, compared with only 17 percent of casino gamblers living 100 miles away from a casino.6

    · At the short-lived New Orleans land-based casino, local residents made up 60 percent of the clientele.7

    · According to gambling researcher William Thompson, a professor at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, “(Casinos) have a negative impact on the community unless 50 percent of the gamblers come from out of state.”8

    <

    p>You might also consider Parx

    <

    p>From
    The McDonald’s of Gambling

    <

    p>

    “You said [patrons come] 150 to 200 times a year,” he repeated. “That’s three to four times a week, essentially.”

    “Yes,” Jonas confirmed, most of his players fit that profile. In fact, because Parx players tend to live within 20 miles of Street Road, many go even more frequently.

    “We have customers,” Jonas boasted, “who give us $25, $30 five times a week.”

    <

    p>From False Job Creation

    <

    p>

    Rivers Casino is one of nine operating casinos in Pennsylvania and employs about 1,000 people.

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    p>

    The board has to permit the casino to drop below the current level of 3,000 slot machines because state law requires casinos to maintain the number of slots in place as of Oct. 1, 2009.

    Casino officials said they would submit an application Tuesday to reduce the number of slot machines to 2,874.

    <

    p>Where are 15,000 jobs?

    <

    p>They’re simply not there.  

    • the limited number of jobs actually created are coming at the expense of: the addicted, the desperate, lonely, and easy to take advantage of.

      <

      p>Exploiting the less fortunate to avoid responsibility for our community, is always attractive til we find out the person being exploited is our child, parent, neighbor or loved one.

  4. in contrast to 2 of Middleboro’s Reps, Tom Calter and Steve Canessa who have ignored my requests to explain why they voted against the self-exclusion amendment.

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    p>The 3rd Middleboro Rep is the invisible one who flip-flopped, William Straus.

    <

    p>Senator Tucker
    offered simple math —

    <

    p>

    SIMPLE MATH is not so simple on Beacon Hill!

    God Bless Senator Tucker for offering a simple math lesson today!

    Casino Shills, after counting Massachusetts license plates, have determined that CT Casinos get

    $1 BILLION FROM MASSACHUSETTS RESIDENTS

    Of that, at 25% tax, Massachusetts MIGHT collect

    $250 MILLION

    if Massachusetts ‘re-captured’ 100% of that expenditure.

    BUT – Innovation projects that Massachusetts will only ‘re-capture’ about

    50%

    or

    $125 MILLION

    Spectrum Gaming projected that the Massachusetts Lottery would lose

    $144 MILLION

    with legalized casino gambling.

    Then there’s that Pesky MASSIVE STATE REGULATORY BUREAUCRACY that Senator Rosenberg doesn’t want to put a number on – Is it $20 MILLION? $50 MILLION?

    Sounds like a loser however you add and subtract.

    Senator Tucker, A special thanks for doing the complicated math the rest of your colleagues can’t do!

    <

    p>Without boggling my brain attempting to explain more complex math, remember what is not included in the very simple calculation above that you, the taxpayer will fund:

    <

    p>local public safety costs one would reasonably expect just from additional traffic, accidents, additional drunk drivers from the free alcohol service, arrests and investigation

    <

    p>local police costs due to increased money-related crimes

    <

    p>increased court costs
    increased incarceration costs

    <

    p>increased personal auto insurance caused by additional auto accidents

    <

    p>additional personnel in Attorney General’s Office

    <

    p>addtional personnel in State Police

    <

    p>additional vehicles and office space

    <

    p>additional benefits costs: healthcare, pensions, sick leave

    <

    p>Depending on which Slap Dash version of this legislation got approved (since even they really can’t be sure what they voted on), there was an hourly rate for state police that was to be reimbursed by the SLOT BARNS, but little else.

    <

    p>And if this incarnation follows the path of Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, they each recruited overseas. So look to have local public education costs increase with no additional funding.

    <

    p>The little town of Palmer needs $50 million to provide water.

    <

    p>That’s just for starters.

    <

    p>I’m sure you can think of other costs. Beacon Hill can’t.
     

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