Farewell. The Flying Pig Has Left The Building.

Steve Hynd, August 16, 2012

After four years on the Typepad site, eight years total blogging, Newshoggers is closing it's doors today. We've been coasting the last year or so, with many of us moving on to bigger projects (Hey, Eric!) or simply running out of blogging enthusiasm, and it's time to give the old flying pig a rest.

We've done okay over those eight years, although never being quite PC enough to gain wider acceptance from the partisan "party right or wrong" crowds. We like to think we moved political conversations a little, on the ever-present wish to rush to war with Iran, on the need for a real Left that isn't licking corporatist Dem boots every cycle, on America's foreign misadventures in Afghanistan and Iraq. We like to think we made a small difference while writing under that flying pig banner. We did pretty good for a bunch with no ties to big-party apparatuses or think tanks.

Those eight years of blogging will still exist. Because we're ending this typepad account, we've been archiving the typepad blog here. And the original blogger archive is still here. There will still be new content from the old 'hoggers crew too. Ron writes for The Moderate Voice, I post at The Agonist and Eric Martin's lucid foreign policy thoughts can be read at Democracy Arsenal.

I'd like to thank all our regular commenters, readers and the other bloggers who regularly linked to our posts over the years to agree or disagree. You all made writing for 'hoggers an amazingly fun and stimulating experience.

Thank you very much.

Note: This is an archive copy of Newshoggers. Most of the pictures are gone but the words are all here. There may be some occasional new content, John may do some posts and Ron will cross post some of his contributions to The Moderate Voice so check back.


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Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Slot Saturation

By Dave Anderson:


I'm a bit late on this upbeat August 5th press release from the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board, but I've been pounding the drums on casino revenue, and I think there are a couple of warning flares that are being fired.



The amount of gross terminal revenue generated in July 2009 through the play of slot machines at eight casinos rose 18.46% over the previous year, according to figures released today by the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board.


The eight casinos in July 2009 generated $179,154,226 in gross terminal revenue compared to $151,240,724 from in July 2008 when seven casinos were in operation. Tax collections by the Commonwealth on that amount last month, based on the 55% rate, were $98,534,824, an average of $3.18 million per day. The casinos� collective take of the gross revenue for the month was $80,619,402.


The amount of gross revenue generated in July 2009 through the play of slot machines at the seven casinos that were also operating in July of the previous year rose 5.49%.


Okay, on first glance, this is fairly good news; one new casino opened up and produced significant new revenue system wide, and the seven casinos that had been open for more than a year also saw revenue growth that was equal or slightly greater than nominal GDP growth. Both of those indicators are positive signs if we are analyzing the casinos like they are retailers.


However, there were a few negative nuggets that lept out at me. The first was that three of the seven pre-exisiting casinos had revenue declines. Secondly, the largest revenue gainer was the Meadows Casino. I suspect that this was because the Meadows Casino moved from a bare-bones temporary facility into a non-ramshackle permanent facility. Basically, I think this was a one time shift in revenue, and not a recurring trend. Finally, there was this line on the numberof slots machines operating in the state:



The average number of operating slot machines at these facilities was 16,194 in July 2008 and 21,826 in July 2009.


34% more machines were operating in July 2009 than were operating in July 2008. Those additional machines only contributed to an 18.5% increase in revenue. In 2008, the average take per machine per day was $301, while in 2009, the average take was $265, or approximately a 12% decline. The latest data shows even greater declines in revenue per machine per day.


I think there is a good chance that the Pennsylvania slots gambling market is reaching saturation in the current economic conditions. Adding new machines is generating far less marginal revenue than originally projected. We are seeing that in the July data, and we are seeing that in the low revenue figures for the Pittsburgh casino. The possibility of saturation is something that we need to keep in mind as another 5 locations are authorized as well as another 36,000 machines (split between the new locations and additions to under-capacity locations). The casinos won't produce enough revenue to bail out everyone's pet project.



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1 comment:

  1. smintheusSeptember 3, 2009 at 4:33 AM

    Point taken about saturation. But it's never good news if gambling revenues increase. Pennsylvania shouldn't be in the business of encouraging people to fritter away their money in highly addictive ways.

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