Skip to main content

Casinos are private businesses: we privatized their gains, so let's not socialize their losses

First, a note:  Wade Malcolm's reporting on the casino issue is written to the standard to which the News Journal should aspire.  I've known Wade for about four years (personal disclaimer) since he had the higher ed beat, and I've always known him to pursue multiple sources and dedicate research time necessary to understand a subject before he started writing about it.

But the fact of the matter is this:  casino owners have made millions as corporate tax farmers for the State of Delaware.  Everybody involved knew (or damn sure should have known) that the glut of casino profits and tax revenue was a time-limited thing.

Casino operators had the business obligation to diversify, innovate, or die on the vine when nearby states got into the act.  Given three choices, they have selected (D):  keep blindly doing what you were doing all along and whine to the state for more money when times are tough.

Likewise, the Governor and the General Assembly had to realize that this steady stream of gambling revenue couldn't last forever, and they should know by now (as Wade's article pointed out), that there's actually not much Delaware can actually do to save the casinos.

So next year it is time to tighten the budget belt (again!) and start looking for the "next big thing" to generates some millions to spend on buying hunting preserves in Sussex or new sidewalks in specific Wilmington neighborhoods.

Here's a hint, General Assembly:



It took decades before the organizers of Firefly proved what everybody should have known from NASCAR races at Dover Downs:  if you put on events of regional and national interest, they will come, and they will spend money by the millions.  When they spend money by the millions, our businesses do well and gross receipt revenues go up.

So maybe we should be researching how to make Delaware more attractive to big event promoters, since we already have a great location.  A study on how to do that would cost only a fraction of the $8 million that Governor Harding Markell proposes to bail out a dying industry.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I still dont understand why Dover Downs showcases such acts as Earthquake (who the hell is Earthquake) when you've got a stadium that hold a hundred thousand people and could hold major summer acts on the infield like Dave Matthews, Kenny Chesney, Jimmy Buffett, etc. That seems like a larger draw than Earthquake.

Popular posts from this blog

The Obligatory Libertarian Tax Day Post

The most disturbing factoid that I learned on Tax Day was that the average American must now spend a full twenty-four hours filling out tax forms. That's three work days. Or, think of it this way: if you had to put in two hours per night after dinner to finish your taxes, that's two weeks (with Sundays off). I saw a talking head economics professor on some Philly TV channel pontificating about how Americans procrastinate. He was laughing. The IRS guy they interviewed actually said, "Tick, tick, tick." You have to wonder if Governor Ruth Ann Minner and her cohorts put in twenty-four hours pondering whether or not to give Kraft Foods $708,000 of our State taxes while demanding that school districts return $8-10 million each?

New Warfare: I started my posts with a discussion.....

.....on Unrestricted warfare . The US Air force Institute for National Security Studies have developed a reasonable systems approach to deter non-state violent actors who they label as NSVA's. It is an exceptionally important report if we want to deter violent extremism and other potential violent actors that could threaten this nation and its security. It is THE report our political officials should be listening to to shape policy so that we do not become excessive in using force against those who do not agree with policy and dispute it with reason and normal non-violent civil disobedience. This report, should be carefully read by everyone really concerned with protecting civil liberties while deterring violent terrorism and I recommend if you are a professional you send your recommendations via e-mail at the link above so that either 1.) additional safeguards to civil liberties are included, or 2.) additional viable strategies can be used. Finally, one can only hope that politici

More of This, Please

Or perhaps I should say, "Less of this one, please." Or how about just, "None of them. Ever again. Please....For the Love of God." Sunshine State Poll: Grayson In Trouble The latest Sunshine State/VSS poll shows controversial Democratic incumbent Alan Grayson trailing former state Senator Dan Webster by seven points, 43 percent to 36 percent. A majority of respondents -- 51 percent -- disapprove of the job that Grayson is doing. Independents have an unfavorable view of him as well, by a 36/47 margin. Grayson has ignored the conventional wisdom that a freshman should be a quiet member who carefully tends to the home fires. The latest controversy involves his " Taliban Dan " advertisement, where he explicitly compares his opponent to the Taliban, and shows a clip of Webster paraphrasing Ephesians 5:22 -- "wives, submit to your husbands." An unedited version of the clip shows that Webster was actually suggesting that husba