One of the effects of regional casinos is the sex trafficking of minors. This atrocity is garnering more and more attention nationwide as the number of children affected increases.
Increase in sex trafficking of minors getting local, state attention
Regional Casinos
Casinos do not provide budgetary stability they promise
Casinos fail to increase revenue even though casino leaders continue to promise to the contrary, according to an article in the Lexington Herald-Leader in Kentucky. Instead of generating new income to provide for education and other services, experts say casinos provide an unstable and unsuccessful base for revenue and caution against using them to fix budgetary problems.
Study Shows Slot Machines Are Built to Deceive
According to this Washington Post story, a new report reveals that slot machines are manufactured to trick players. The machines often use positive reinforcement, in the form of celebratory sounds, to convince gamblers they have won when they are actually losing their money.
Study Shows Far Better Strategies Exist to Create Jobs Than Casinos
As part of their costly public relations campaigns to gain approval for casinos, gambling operators and their supporters commonly promote the narrative that there is little alternative to their proposal to “add” jobs to a region. “If not this casino,” they ask, “what else is there to put local people to work?” While there are no short cuts to building real prosperity in a community, there are much better options than the path of failure offered by casinos. Here is one: Economists James Heintz and Robert Pollin of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, found that infrastructure investment spending in general creates about 18,000 total jobs for every $1 billion in new investment spending. This number include jobs directly created by hiring for the specific project, jobs indirectly created by supplier firms, and jobs induced when workers go out and spend their paychecks and boost their local economy. Below is their 2009 report.
Facebook online casinos entice young people to gamble
The UK’s MailOnline reports online gambling giant 888 has struck a lucrative deal with Facebook to offer Las Vegas-style slot machines and other games funded by credit and debit card transactions up to £500 (roughly US $761). Facebook and its gambling partners have been training youth with slot and bingo-style games. The Mail quotes Mark Griffiths, professor of gambling studies at Nottingham Trent University citing research showing that playing free games online is a big factor in developing problem gambling. He warned the new apps will open the floodgates as “gambling companies dive into the social media frenzy to make money. It is thought Facebook will take a 30 percent cut of all bets placed.”
These free games are available to US customers as well. Online game giant Zynga for months has featured intrusive popups and ads pushing their slots and poker games in their ubiquitous “Words with Friends” blockbuster game.
Social network is tempting young to gamble with new betting games
Health Impacts of Gambling Expansion in Toronto
Toronto Board of Health has released a new report that explains, in part, that “problem gambling is a significant public health concern … impacting upwards of 11,000 people aged 18+ in the greater Toronto area.” This disturbing statistic is among many that the Board finds, as the seriousness of problem gambling grows as casinos and online gambling expand.
Niagara Falls has not seen the spinoff development promised from city casino
Officials in Niagara Falls, New York are preparing to mark the 10th anniversary of the casino, which opened with much anticipation and rave reviews on New Year’s Eve 2002. Casino proponents at the time said the casino marked a new era in the development of Niagara Falls. Yet after ten years, the spinoff development that some anticipated has yet to develop on a large scale, and some downtown business owners, including developer Carl P. Paladino, say the company enjoys unfair advantages by not paying taxes on its properties.
Casino bets that it’s time for change
Louisiana State Government Has a Self-Inflicted Epidemic of Gambling Addiction
According to the Louisiana Association on Compulsive Gambling, about 4.4 percent of adults over 21 in Louisiana, or as many as 159,000 people, demonstrate problematic or pathological gambling. The problem is even worse among young adults. About 14.3 percent of adults between 18 and 21 have problematic or pathological gambling issues. That’s as many as 23,000 people.
How a magic carpet ride became a slot machine game
Chicago-based WMS have created a slot machine that provides a ride-like experience for users. The idea behind this new wave of slot machine was that once you experience it, you will keep playing, reaching into your pocket, and putting in money to try to win this ride. Aladdin, being magical, was a seemingly perfect fit for the empty but enticing nature of slots.
Ralph Nader on why casinos are the wrong direction for America
The nation’s most respected consumer advocate, Ralph Nader, speaks powerfully about how government-sanctioned gambling lowers our standard of living and exploits and defrauds citizens.