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Pennsylvania, top in Boosting the Gambling Industry

Posted on May 6th, 2011

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From an annual report released by the American Gaming Association, headed by its President and Chief Executive Officer Frank Fahrenkopf, Jr., Pennsylvania is named the leading state that contributed most in boosting the gambling industry in the year 2010. The country’s total revenue from the gambling industry reached a gross total of $34.6 billion last year, showing a slight increase of 0.9 percent from that of 2009. It showed a positive growth compared to a consecutive decline in 2008 and 2009. Fahrenkopf called for a conference call with the media to announce the results and said during the discussion: “Clearly, a 1 percent increase is not indicative of a complete recovery. This recovery is going to be slow and laborious, particularly because the national economy is still struggling to fully emerge from the recession. As consumer discretionary spending goes, so goes our industry. We’re not out of the woods yet, but this modest increase coming after two years of declining revenues is significant.”

Fahrenkopf attributed the major additions to Pennsylvania’s gaming industry as the primary mover of the positive growth, specifically when the state added table games over its current slots. However, he also noted changes in other states like Connecticut, Delaware, and Maryland among others. These states have been successful in expanding gambling to their territory, “As a result, casinos across 22 states continue to make significant contributions to the U.S. economy,” he said. The study further pointed out that despite the impediment caused by the worldwide recession, the casino industry still endured and took necessary adjustments to keep the industry afloat, if not improve, and the efforts have paid off as the increase shows.

Pennsylvania made it to the top making a record of increased revenue by 26.4% or $2.49 billion, the state can also boast that from its casino industry they were able to reduce unemployment rate by adding 12,664 jobs in 2009 to 2010, an almost 39 percent increase. Apart from the additional table games introduced in the state, the Sugarhouse Casino opened in Philadelphia in September 2010 was an important factor. The state’s two cities, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, grabbed a place in the top 20 US casino markets based on revenue. Philadelphia was also recognized as the top racetrack casino market in the United States along with Parx Casino in Bensalem and Harrah’s Chester Casino and Racetrack in Delaware County.

While Pennsylvania is benefiting from its recent triumph, the gambling capital of the East Coast- Atlantic City, New Jersey- is suffering a steep decline in revenue, among the largest in fact in all other states. Its revenue falls down by 9.4 percent, from$3.94 billion to $3.57 billion. As a result, its employment rate went down by 6.1 percent, equivalent of 2,232 casino jobs. The report said that a decrease in consumer spending and growing regional competition have impacted to the decline. To address the declining fate of the gambling industry of the state, Gov. Christie initiated to have the industry run by the state, Fahrenkopf said during the conference call that he favored such move by the governor and said: “From our perspective, we have to realize the great difficulty that the casinos and the city of Atlantic City have been going through from the first time the first slot machine appeared in Pennsylvania. Now, with table games appearing in Delaware, it was very important that something had to be done.” He cited further that the Governor’s initiative was confirmed by most of the casino operators and considered it to be great move to recover from its present state.

The American Gaming Association, the national trade association for the commercial casino industry named the 13th annual report as “State of the States”, detailing data from respective states such as revenues, tax contributions, employments specifically the number of jobs and employment wages. The report only included data from “commercial casinos” of different states to provide a more accurate analysis. So, excluded from the report are data from tribal casinos which considerably plenty in the United States. “Commercial casinos” now include resort casino hotels –regardless if land-based or riverboats/dockside- and racetrack casinos. In previous years, the association tallied them both separately.