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Pennsylvania Slots Doing Great

In today’s economy, it is always wonderful to hear that any sector is experiencing a boost. That’s why we love hearing that the slot machines in Pennsylvania are generating strong revenues for 2009. The year 2009 is still young, but Old Line State slots are already growing at double-digit rates of increase! Already, two casinos in the northeastern part of the state have been identified as real superstars, with the lion’s share of the proceeds.

The total amount of money spent of slot machines subtracting the payouts (prizes) is known as the gross terminal revenue. GTR in Pennsylvania casinos jumped a full one hundred forty-six million dollars in February, for a twenty-one percent increase! Overall revenues increased eighteen percent, to one hundred twenty-six million dollars. That’s on top of January’s twenty-three percent leap in gross terminal wagers and does not even factor in revenues from the Hollywood Casino at Penn National, which only opened a few weeks ago. Other than the Harrisburg site, no other casinos have opened any new facilities.

The increases in slot machine gambling were a blissful surprise for the state, which certainly was not anticipating such largesse in the midst of a full-fledged economic crisis. Reports from the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board are that the slots are reaping “significant” revenues for the state, far and above what could be anticipated in this economy. It’s definitely the slots, though – there is nothing else that could have possibly contributed to the tax boosts. Nobody knows exactly why the state’s slot machines are getting such a boost, but nobody’s looking a seventy-to-eighty-million-dollar-a-month-increase-in-tax-revenues gift horse in the mouth, either.

Back to March 2009 Archive.