More on Kathryn's Media Quote and the "Spectrum of Success"

Thread: Indian Gaming in the News

In our June 24th post, we provided a link to this June 21 article that appeared in the Akron (Ohio) Beacon-Journal in which Kathryn is quoted. Most people tend to assume that the Indian gaming industry is monolithic, undifferentiated – one big success story for all involved (at least, for the tribes). Let’s think more about the “spectrum of success” we mentioned in our last post in this thread. Again, that’s why Kathryn’s quote provides valuable context to the article.

On one end of the spectrum, more than a third of all tribal gaming enterprises earn less than $10 million in annual revenue, just over two percent of the industry’s total revenue, and a quarter of Indian gaming operations earn less than $3 million each year – often just enough to keep the casino open and provide modest funding for tribal government programs. On the other end of the spectrum, only about fifty-five tribal casinos – about one in seven – take in more than two-thirds of all Indian gaming revenue, each earning over $100 million annually.

To understand what this looks like, one merely need compare a rural bingo hall on the Great Plains to a Las Vegas-style casino near a major city, like San Diego or Minneapolis. In our book, Indian Gaming and Tribal Sovereignty: The Casino Compromise, we tell two fascinating stories to illustrate the spectrum’s poles: on one end, the phenomenal profitability of the Pequots’ Foxwoods Resort Casino in Connecticut, and on the other end, the modest-at-best economic success of Plains Tribes’ casinos in North Dakota.

In the Beacon-Journal article, Kathryn also observes that as Indian gaming has expanded, so too has political backlash against it. We’ll take up that important and fascinating topic in future posts.