The iron rule of gaming is this: The odds always favor the house. That’s as true of the Las Vegas blackjack table and the Atlantic City slot machine as it is of the constitutional amendment New Yorkers are being asked to approve on Election Day.
New York’s ballot measure proposes seven new casinos for the state. If that’s all the initiative said, we could at least have a straight up or down vote on more casinos. But like the casinos themselves, New York state prefers to stack the odds in its favor — so it added language that claimed benefits (e.g., more money for schools) without any acknowledgment of costs.
This is a bad bet for many reasons. To start with, legalized gambling is essentially a tax on the poor. In addition, legalized gambling brings all sorts of social costs in its wake, from family bankruptcy to lower property values. If you believe casinos are the path to revitalizing neighborhoods, take a walk through Atlantic City.
Even the economic benefits are no longer assured. We’ll leave aside that casinos operate as quasi-monopolies, not the competitive businesses upon which real wealth is based. The idea that casinos are a sure-fire money minter is just not true anymore.
All this would be reason enough to vote down this initiative. But the ballot’s added language suggesting cost-free benefits merits its own rebuke. New Yorkers would do well to regard this language with the same credibility we give to the promises of carnival barkers, The Post urges a “No” on Proposal 1.
If the governor wants to revitalize New York, let’s not do it by taxing those who can least afford it. Let’s do it the old-fashioned way: by building an economy that encourages thrift, investment and enterprise.