{"id":13741,"date":"2014-06-09T12:12:47","date_gmt":"2014-06-09T20:12:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=13741"},"modified":"2014-06-09T12:33:29","modified_gmt":"2014-06-09T20:33:29","slug":"13741","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/13741\/","title":{"rendered":"New York: Promises and excuses"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Sterling-Forest-Resort\"<\/a>New York<\/strong> casino developers are enumerating the economic benefits for their prospective employees. Make no mistake, many of the jobs will be entry-level, minimum-wage employment<\/a>. Saratoga Casino & Raceway<\/strong> is predicted a 47%\/30% split between unskilled and skilled employees, with managerial jobs topping out at $180,000\/year. In general, would-be casino owners predict a $30,000-$70,000. Alabama<\/strong> firm Greenetrack<\/strong> is pretty “george,” promising $20\/hour salaries. Genting Group<\/strong> has upped the ante to $50,000\/year for workers at its proposed Sterling Forest Resort <\/strong>(above<\/em>). That’s been matched by Caesars Entertainment<\/strong>, which proposes to employee 3,000 souls, what’s more.<\/p>\n

This all compares favorably to Atlantic City<\/strong> where the median wage is below $30,000\/year and the minimum wage for tipped employees is a meager $2.13. In New York, it’s $4.50, soon to go up to $5.05. (Both Saratoga and Nevele Investors<\/strong> are working with local colleges to develop hospitality and gaming curriculum.)<\/p>\n

When state gaming commissioners weigh where to put casinos, they may have a harder time than expected in choosing between Sullivan County<\/strong> and Orange Count<\/strong>y. Sullivan’s unemployment rate is higher (7%) but fewer people — 2,200 — are out of work. The jobless rate in Orange County is but 5%, but that represents 8,900 people. That’s going to be a difficult consideration to weigh.<\/p>\n

* New York State leads the U.S. in gambling revenues, so its racinos could \"Pretlow\"<\/a>absorb a damp first half of the year. And indeed, managements are racing for the “God did it” excuse (“Weekend after weekend of rain and snow most certainly had a chilling effect on our first quarter numbers.”)<\/span>\u00a0to explain away declines in revenues. At least Assemblyman Gary Pretlow<\/strong> (D, left<\/em>), chairman of the Racing Committee, was on terra firma<\/em> when “said the racinos\u2019 recent woes are indicative of a struggling gambling market across the nation.” Pretlow’s consequently fielding requests from the industry for longer hours of operation and an increase in free-play allowances.<\/span><\/p>\n

Net win at the tracks was off 2%, although two racinos defied the odds. Batavia Downs<\/strong> was up 9% and Resorts World New York<\/strong> also saw a gain. Losers included Tioga Downs<\/strong> (-8%), Empire City Casino<\/strong> at Yonkers Raceway<\/strong> (-7%) and Buffalo Raceway<\/strong> (-18%). Strange how all that rain and snow depressed Empire City’s results but didn’t hurt proximate Resorts World’s.<\/p>\n

* Las Vegas<\/strong>‘ Spanish-language populace continues to grow in importance and the Lucky Club<\/strong> has added bilingual bingo<\/a> to its offerings. S&G<\/em> applauds the move — and deplores the cascade of cretins posting racist comments on the Las Vegas Review-Journal<\/em>‘s Web site … an aftereffect from the paper’s many years of promoting intolerance.<\/p>\n

* Who knew? Singapore<\/strong> residents — despite governmental attempts at deterrence — the world’s leaders<\/a> per capita<\/em> in casino gambling.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New York casino developers are enumerating the economic benefits for their prospective employees. Make no mistake, many of the jobs will be entry-level, minimum-wage employment. Saratoga Casino & Raceway is predicted a 47%\/30% split between unskilled and skilled employees, with … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[133,14,53,101,78,111,108],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13741"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13741"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13744,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13741\/revisions\/13744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}