Lawmakers must recognize the dark side of gambling

Lawmakers must recognize the dark side of gambling


One need only look at the dismal revenue numbers for Atlantic City casinos to understand that Pennsylvania casinos have achieved one of the industry's goals. Gambling advocates in Pennsylvania long have argued that if Pennsylvanians are going to gamble, the commonwealth should enable them to do so in order to keep the revenue in-state.

It's not clear just how much of Atlantic City's losses are attributable directly to the new and growing Pennsylvania industry. The gambling industry there also faces competition from other new markets, such as Delaware and New York.

But Atlantic City casino revenue has declined steadily for three years, in lock-step with casino growth in Pennsylvania. It declined 11 percent when Pennsylvania's slots first opened. And when Pennsylvania table games opened, revenue at Atlantic City gambling tables declined 16 percent.

Three of Pennsylvania's 10 casinos, in Philadelphia and Chester and Bucks counties, are in the heart of Atlantic City's prime marketing area.

Acquiring that revenue, of course, also means acquiring the severe downside of gambling - the addiction and other social pathologies that come with the territory.

Sunday on the CBS news show, "60 Minutes," Gov. Ed Rendell uncharacteristically lost his composure when correspondent Leslie Stahl pressed him on the question of whether the vast expansion of gambling in Pennsylvania - especially its more than 60,000 authorized slot machines - also had spurred addiction.

The governor bristled, acknowledging the existence of gambling addiction but contending that those addicted would have become so regardless of whether the commonwealth had made gambling one of its primary revenue sources.

That notion was contradicted, however, by several people who appeared in the segment and said they became addicted after casinos opened near their Pennsylvania homes. And there is no question that the Pennsylvania industry has created new gamblers; without them, the casinos could not produce the revenue that Mr. Rendell and other gambling advocates cite.

But gambling advocates never have accepted the negative realities that come with the industry - not only the life-altering addiction, but the tendency of self-sustaining casinos to diminish economic activity in surrounding communities.

Many politicians love casinos as sources of substantial revenue that they do not have to call a tax. And it's all the more attractive to them when they decline to factor in the social and economic costs. The state government should recognize those costs and do everything in its power to mitigate them.