The Casino Industry

The casino is a place where people can gamble and play games of chance. There are a wide variety of casino games, including blackjack, roulette, poker, craps and keno. The casino industry is regulated by state and local laws. Casinos are also often a center of entertainment and attract tourists from around the world.

Casinos make money by charging patrons to play their games. Typically, this fee is a percentage of each bet. This advantage can be very small—lower than two percent, in fact—but over the millions of bets that casino patrons place each year it adds up. Casinos also make money by selling food, drink and souvenirs.

In addition to charging patrons to play their games, casinos often use technology to monitor and supervise the games themselves. For example, casino chips are built with microcircuitry that allows the casino to track the exact amount of money wagered minute by minute and warn if any anomaly is detected; and roulette wheels are electronically monitored regularly to discover quickly any statistical deviation from their expected results. Casinos are also increasingly using video cameras to oversee their gambling spaces and monitor their patrons.

While the mob may have supplied the initial bankroll for Reno and Las Vegas casinos, legitimate businessmen soon realized that the taint of organized crime was an obstacle to attracting a wider range of American visitors. As a result, hotel chains and real estate investors began to buy up the properties, taking sole or partial ownership and even hiring casino managers in order to distance themselves from the gangsters’ seamy image.