From The Christian Science Monitor In an economy racked by widespread unemployment, is the opportunity to create tens of thousands of jobs worth granting an exception on Spain‘s two-year-old strict anti-smoking legislation? That’s the question currently facing Spain’s government, as it considers meeting American casino mogul Sheldon Adelson’s condition to invest billions in a proposed massive casino complex, dubbed “EuroVegas,” in the outskirts of Madrid. In line with most European legislation, smoking has been forbidden indoors in Spain since 2011, when after years of pressure from health officials and civil society groups, Parliament overwhelmingly approved the ban. Research suggests smoking…

The Venetian Macau, located in a former Portuguese colony and a currently a special administrative region under the People’s Republic of China, is known as a gambling mecca. Macau’s gambling industry attracts millions of tourists from all over Asia, particularly China each year, and comprises more than 50% of the national GDP. The gambling revenues of Macau surpass those of Las Vegas by many folds, and the Venetian Macau is a major contributor to these revenues. As the largest casino in the world, the Venetian is more than just another casino resort. The International Indian Film Academy Awards, IIFA, this…

From Gaming Today The Supreme Court will decide whether the Bay Mills Indian Community’s casino in Michigan’s northern Lower Peninsula can be ordered closed by a judge. The high court on Monday agreed to hear an appeal from state officials, who say they can order the casino to be closed because it is not on the tribe’s lands. A federal judge agreed and issued an injunction ordering the casino closed in 2011. The Vanderbilt casino opened in November 2010 and is located about 125 miles south of the Bay Mills reservation in the Upper Peninsula. The 6th Circuit Court of…

From AL.com Two economists studied federal corruption conviction rates in states before and after they legalized casino gambling between the years 1985 to 2000. Mississippi tops the list. According to The Pew Research Center, economists Douglas M. Walker and Peter T. Calcagno analyzed the average number of corruption convictions for every 10,000 state employees. The result was four out of the five states with the highest annual rates of public corruption were casino states. Per the report: Mississippi led the list with almost four public corruption convictions a year per 10,000 state employees followed by Louisiana, Illinois and South Dakota. At…

The owners of senior video gambling parlors are hoping lawsuits filed in South Florida that call, in part, for the closure of Dave & Buster’s until it gets rid of its recently outlawed video gambling machines, will help spur opposition to the overall video gaming ban. Fort Lauderdale attorney Michael Wolf is working with a pair of plaintiffs: former arcade owner Robert Forst and Florida Arcade Association investigator Carlos De Varona, both of whom have ties to current senior video gambling parlors owners, according to The Miami Herald. In addition to Dave & Buster’s, the lawsuits are calling for Boomers…

From Science Daily It is often said that more gambling (including playing the lottery) takes place during economic crises, but a study carried out by researchers at Universidad Carlos III of Madrid (UC3M) indicates that the opposite is true: in the last year, people have decreased the frequency of gambling activities, the number of gambling activities participated in and the amount of money gambled. The gambling industry has not escaped the changes in people’s habits and behavior that the crisis has produced. This is one of the conclusions that can be drawn from the latest report on Spaniards’ perception of…