Editor’s note: For details on the Massachusetts ballot questions, see Ballotpedia.org.
To the editor:
Vote “yes” on ballot Question 3 expanding prohibitions on gaming.
By creating a dependency on casino revenue, states become stakeholders in the gambling industry itself, obligated by necessity and self-interest to ensure and maintain casino profits. But casinos are failing. Nine out of 12 casinos in New Jersey have filed for bankruptcy and closed due to 35 percent loss of earnings between 2012 and 2013.
Some other points to consider:
- In 1999, the federal government advised states to stop building casinos because of an already oversaturated market. Moody’s recently downgraded the casino industry’s outlook from “stable” to “negative.”
- “Host communities” do not witness economic development spin-off because casino operators do everything they can to keep customers in the casino rather than patronize neighborhood businesses.
- Casinos do not create high-paying long-term jobs. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median annual salary of gaming service employees and dealers is less than half the $41,000 casinos claim. Construction jobs only last for a few years.
- The social burdens of gambling, addiction and crime fall disproportionately on the poor, the elderly, and minorities. They spend a higher portion of their income on gambling. Today, 30 percent of Atlantic City residents live below the poverty line, and the unemployment rate of 13.8 percent is the highest in the country.
- Crime, including embezzlement, robbery, DUI, aggravated assaults, domestic violence, sex trafficking, and public corruption increases right after casino is built, and continues to increase after that. Local communities have to pick up the tab.
- State and local “leadership” and host communities refuse to consider the related cost of casinos to Massachusetts taxpayers. Based on experience of other states, the social cost in fighting crime and addiction, the cost of a new regulatory bureaucracy and the cost in lost lottery revenue would surely exceed the casino revenue. Cities, towns and taxpayers will suffer in the long run.
Compare all of that to the recent Assembly Square development in Somerville that is projected to create 9,700 permanent jobs, 10,300 construction jobs and will use only about one-third the land area. That sounds like a better choice to me.
Sincerely,
Gary Davis
20R Indian Camp Lane
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