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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Friday, December 18, 2009

Casino Cash Crash

By Dave Anderson:


The Pittsburgh Rivers Casino has broken out of its trend revenue. 


The  nose-dive has recommenced.  Last week, the casino took in $143 dollars per machine per day.  The week before that, the Rivers took in $154 per machine per day.  This is a dramatic change. 


After the G-20 effectively closed the city and thus the casino for a chunk of the last week of September, the Rivers Casino revenue per machine per day had entered a channel of roughly $160 to $180 per machine per day.  It held this revenue level during Thanksgiving, and while it was significantly inadequate to meet state or owner projections of $306 or $350+ per machine per day, it might be enough to cover debt service obligations.  At this point, the Rivers is on pace to earn slightly less than half the revenue projected by the state and slightly less than 40% of the revenue projected by its owners.  I wonder when the first story in the P-G concerning potential bankruptcy or debt restructuring talks will be published. 


This is despite significantly increased advertising on radio, and television, as well as increased promotional play.  The Rivers is significantly underperforming state wide gambling metrics, so cannibalization is something that is fairly simple to reject. 


This is a problem of regional significance because both the City of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County have been using the local share of projected gambling tax revenue to fill large gaps in their operational budgets.  The gap is fairly small this fiscal year, but will widen next year and years to come. 



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1 comment:

  1. beebsDecember 19, 2009 at 2:12 PM

    Gambling is a tax on stupid people who don't understand statistics.
    It seems that the State of PA is trying to balance its budgets from the pockets of the poor.

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