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Posted on 08/07/2025 8:47:22 AM PDT by Red Badger
Vegas was better when the Mafia ran it. There, we said it.
Back then, the city wasn’t a soulless corporate cash machine; it was a destination built for working-class Americans to have a good time, blow off some steam, and feel like high-rollers for a weekend. The Mafia understood their customers because they were their customers. They knew you didn’t nickel-and-dime a guy on his way to the blackjack table. You gave him cheap rooms, free drinks, affordable and abundant buffets, and enough glitz to make him feel like a big shot for a few days. The real money came from the action inside the casino, and they knew how to keep you coming back for more.
But corporate-run Vegas doesn’t operate that way. Once the stuffy suits took over, the city shifted from hospitality to exploitation. Everything became about maximizing shareholder value instead of giving Joe Blow an unforgettable weekend. Now, in 2025, Vegas is pushing resort fees, paid parking, $30 cocktails, $100 show tickets, inflated table minimums, and slot machines tightened to the point of absurdity. Now, every little thing bleeds you dry before you ever get a chance to feel like a big shot and enjoy yourself. And for the working-class crowd that once made the heart of Vegas tick, those days are long gone. Vegas today is designed to Hoover your wallet dry while giving you less in return.
The old Mob-run Vegas wasn’t perfect, and we’re not trying to glorify organized crime, but they knew the golden rule: keep the customer happy and they’ll keep coming back. The Mob cared about loyalty. They wanted you to leave feeling like you had a great time, even if you lost your shirt. Corporate Vegas doesn’t care if you ever come back. They just want to squeeze every last dime out of you while you’re there. And the result of that soulless mindset is a city that once had character and charm but now has become a sterile, overpriced, corporate strip mall with neon lights.
BroBible:
Las Vegas is dying. Fewer and fewer people are willing to spend a small fortune to visit a tourist destination that seems to get more and more expensive by the day, if not the hour.
Meanwhile, the city itself continues to ignore reality!
Blame is placed on others. Las Vegas chooses not to look internally.
Hotel occupancy rates dropped 14.6% year over year in the month of June. They were down 12.3% through the first 19 days of July.
MGM made major cuts at many of its top properties in May after tourism numbers saw a steep decline in April. Casinos were panicking in February because the gambling-focused city was empty during the Super Bowl, so hotel rooms on The Strip were selling for pennies. Resorts World specifically saw an astonishing 75% dip in revenue during the first quarter.
All of this goes to say that Las Vegas might be in trouble. The city is dying.
Cost goes up, interest goes down. A large part of the recent decline stems from the indefinite increase in price. Everything, everywhere costs more today than it did just five years ago. Duh.
That is even more true in Las Vegas!
Gone are the days of cheap buffets, free drinks, low buy-ins at the card tables and shows that are affordable. That doesn’t even include resort fees, valet, hotel accommodations, etc.
To deny the correlation between the high costs of Las Vegas and the ongoing tourism slump would be silly. People can’t afford to play as many $25 games of Blackjack compared to $5. Nobody wants to pay $17 for a smoothie or $9 for coffee.
But forget reality and actual facts. The left is so desperate to spin Vegas’s decline into an anti-Trump narrative, they’re now blaming him for a slump in tourism years after he left office.
Even The Daily Mail wasted no time cranking out this lazy clickbait take, complete with the claim that international visitors are shunning Vegas “because of Trump.”
One of the reasons Sin City’s businesses are hurting is because international visitors have continued to shun the US – including some upset over the presidency of Donald Trump.
Las Vegas welcomed 3.39 million visitors in March, down almost eight percent from 3.68million in February, according to a report by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.
Hotels were 82.9 percent full the same month, compared with 85.3 percent full in March 2024. Midweek occupancy recorded a decline of 2.5 percent in the same period, despite more than half a million people attending conferences there.
But after getting their anti-Trump TDS headline out of the way, the Daily Mail actually pointed to the real problem, and it has nothing to do with politics. Vegas has priced out the very people who kept it alive, and now the Strip is buried under sky-high costs and a homeless/drug crisis. The Daily Mail piece goes on:
Another reason tourists might be skipping the Strip is its high prices. A visitor recently shared her shock after she was charged $26 for a bottle of Fiji water from the minibar in her room at the Aria Resort & Casino.
And a British magician was left outraged after he was billed $74.31 for two drinks at Sphere in Las Vegas. A 2024 study found that the average income of Las Vegas holidaymakers is now $93,000, with many budget travelers priced out of the gambling capital.
Homelessness in Las Vegas has also exploded, with a conservative estimate of around 8,000 people unhoused across a city of just over half a million. Walk along the busy Las Vegas Boulevard at any time of day and you will see people who are clearly homeless and often under the influence of drugs.
None of this is President Trump’s fault.
The high prices are so out of control that everyone’s competing to find the most outrageous prices in Vegas and posting about it.
That doesn’t sound like a “recipe” for tourism success.
The Telegraph:
In June, a humble bottle of water briefly became a social media sensation, when one stunned traveler revealed that it had been priced at a shocking $26 in the mini-bar at the iconic Bellagio hotel. The story was picked up across the American media.
On the popular discussion website Reddit, meanwhile, forums about Las Vegas have descended into a strange game of Top Trumps, with users competing to see who can find the most excessive examples of Vegas pricing during their visit. “I paid $14 for a bottle of Sprite and $32 for chicken tenders,” posted one user, sounding strangely proud about the whole experience.
The corporations running Las Vegas are working overtime to claw back everything they lost during the so-called “pandemic,” and they’re doing it by sticking it to their customers. The Telegraph piece goes on:
the data shows that prices have jumped disproportionately since the pandemic, with a 50 per cent rise in the average hotel room price since 2019. Fees and charges have also spiked, as casinos seek to make up for lost revenues during the shutdown.
Many experts insist the “Vegas is dying” talk is way overblown. Summer has never been peak season for Sin City; it’s too hot. Also, the city has a history of dipping, rebranding, and roaring back.
That’s all well and good, but if Vegas doesn’t return to its hospitality roots and instead keeps trying to morph into a cold, sterile, American version of Dubai, it’s likely headed for a rude awakening.
Vegas was built on the backs of hardworking Americans looking for an unforgettable weekend, not the overpriced, corporate shell we’re stuck with now.
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“Yes, supposedly it is a true story.”
totally true ... i remembered reading the real-life story years before the movie was made ...
“I just couldn’t understand the Sharon Stone character, why she was so devoted to Lester”
They were both lowlife drug addicts and grifters that enabled each other.......that’s my take anyway.
I’ve mentioned this in a couple other threads on this topic, but when I was in Vegas a year or two, the strip was crawling with “aspiring rappers” of a certain age and race smoking weed on the sidewalk and conducting small-time dope deals. Would have the mob have tolerated that? The question answers itself.
The old Vegas was a great business model for a family. The gamblers could hit the casinos and the rest of the family could hit the shows other attractions, sneak coins into the slots and eat great food at some outstanding restaurants for a fraction of the cost of anyplace else.
Everything was as close to free as possible to allow you to lose as much money as possible at the tables.
Now the prices are sky high for everything and the rooms are really run down in a lot of places.
Why head to Vegas when you can go to a cheaper casino on the rez a few miles down the road and avoid all the craziness and hucksters in Vegas.
“If you want people to spend money you have to treat them like royalty.”
One time mob casino manager in Vegas.
They dont hand out comps like they used to do, dont offer free drinks if your gaming like they used to do, and no more cheap buffets, etc. The attitude from staff is purely arrogant in most places.
They could give a rats ass now. Just dump your money and GTFO.
That is what corporate control brings.
The character played by Dick Smothers in the movie, was based on Harry Reid.
Bean counters ruin everything.
The mob understood that taking care of customers only increased their profits, even with the all the skimming they did.
I don’t even see commercials for Vegas anymore the “what happens in Vegas , stays in Vegas” ad campaign was pretty popular a few years ago. Plus you’d have movies and tv shows in Vegas making it look like a crazy party town where anything can happen.
I’m sure the place has a lot of problems (online gambling cutting into their business) but how do you expect customers if you don’t even advertise ?
“Mr. Rothstein, you people never will understand the way it works out here. You’re all just our guests, but you act like you’re at home. Let me tell you something, partner: you ain’t home, but that’s where we’re gonna send you if it harelips the Governor.”
While I probably like Goodfellas more than Casino, Casino is IMHO the better movie, but it does drag in parts, compared to Goodfellas.
You want to know the facts about the story behind Casino, watch Coffee with Cullotta on Youtube.
I met Frank when i took his mob tour about ten years ago. Went back and took the tour another couple times and he wanted to hear about “Before Vegas, there was Hurley Wisconsin.” I told him the stories that were passed down about all the shenanigans that went on along the iron ranges on the WI and MI border.
“All aboard, Hayward, Hurley and Hell.”
They actually yelled that at the train stations.
I was there only once; I think it was ‘06. The car broke down. Got it fixed & got the heck out of there. Not impressed with the place at all. By the way, I have no plans to return as I am much older & smarter now.
“No records, Artie. What are you gonna do with records, pay taxes?”
The last time I stayed in LV was in 1974. I was doing a short job at a trona mine in CA just over the CA/NV stateline. LV was the closest place to stay. I had a middle-of-the-road, affordable motel and it was just like the author wrote above. I remember morning breakfasts at casinos being almost free (maybe $0.99), the shows were excellent and cheap, and the glitz was low-key, nothing over-the-top. It wasn't my cup of tea, but it was bearable and it felt like it was somewhat stuck in time.
Then the corporations moved in. Now I can't even stand flying through the airport to get to Death Valley. Ugh. What a place.
It was definitely a safe place when the Mob ran things.
They didn’t put up with any BS.............
And there were always an equal number of blueberries in each muffin.
What they did was made it into one big amusement park for a while.
Neglected the casinos and went after that family money.
Its fake.
I live about 80 miles from there and there are very few, if any around here that go up there.
We go to Laughlin about once a month for a night out on the town, but even Laughlin is getting shaky. But, Laughlin has some competition. So hopefully, that prevents any further destruction by corporate BS.
Gotta know how to do it. We can sit down and put a few bucks in the video poker machine at the bar and have several beers and drinks for around ten bucks. Play slow, and drink social.
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