Quote:
Originally Posted by castaway01
You and everyone else. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that if you magically closed 50% of the tracks that revenue and field size would go up at the others---temporarily. It's also the only gambling option in town. Reopen the casinos and have the NBA playoffs and the MLB season going and check those handle numbers again.
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The industry has been committing suicide for decades starting with ADWs, on to casinos etc... If the people running things were so smart, we wouldn't keep doing dumb and shortsighted things.
When the industry started taking casino money all the leaders and biggest names in the sport loved the idea. I was screaming that it was a bad idea long term even if created a windfall in the short term.
It never made sense for governments to allow casino profits to subsidize money losing tracks. That kept zombie tracks open and hurt the rest. Closing them would have been better for the rest of industry and better for the government and taxpayers in those states. They could have used that money and those land resources etc.. and put them to better economic use. Even people as dumb as politicians will eventually figure out when on a net basis the subsidies are costing them money. Most of the zombies should be closed.
Granted, the tracks have less competition now. That's one of many moving parts in the handle right now whose impact can't be isolated, but there's no doubt all the zombies should be closed and the rest would benefit.
