Atlantic City Casinos See Revenues Plunge in September

While gambling revenues may have stabilized in Las Vegas, the news does not seem as promising for Atlantic City. The second largest gambling destination in the United States saw its gambling revenues fall by 12% this September when compared to a year ago, a large decrease that continues three years of poor showings by the seaside resort town.

One possible factor in the steep decline for Atlantic City may be the recent opening of several new casinos in the Mid-Atlantic region. Just a few weeks earlier, the SugarHouse casino opened in Philadelphia, giving gamblers in the city a more convenient location for spending their gambling dollars. Other new casinos in Delaware, Pennsylvania and New York have also hurt business in Atlantic City.

The numbers seem to bear this out as well. While slot machine revenue is down by 9.9%, table games took the biggest hit, with their revenues declining by an incredible 16% over the past year. While many “slot parlors” at racetracks in the region had been taking away some of Atlantic City’s slots revenue for the past few years, the newest round of casino expansion has included table games, which gives even more gamblers a reason not to travel out to the southern New Jersey city.

For the year as a whole, the 11 Atlantic City casinos have had gambling revenues of $2.8 billion, down 8.7% over 2009.

While the entire gambling industry has been struggling, there have been good signs for other locales. For instance, the Las Vegas strip snapped a streak of monthly declines this August, showing an astounding 21% increase over 2009 during the summer month. While revenues are still far below those seen a few years ago, the gains were seen as a sign that the gambling industry may have bottomed out, at least in Nevada.

But Atlantic City has continued to struggle. With casino profits falling, many hotel and casino workers have lost jobs, with thousands more positions being eliminated in the city just this summer. The city’s budget crisis has led the state of New Jersey to step in to oversee the city’s finances, as tax revenue has fallen along with casino income.