What if all the naysayers are right and tourism takes a big hit as the weekend warriors stop coming in from the west and airfares get so high that most people decide not to fly out here. Assuming money is tight all across the country, what happens to Las Vegas?

First, there would be layoffs. Many casinos are laying off management and office employees already.

Many people would lose their jobs and leave town, leaving the housing market in much worse shape.

What about these bazillions of new condo and hotel rooms? Especially the high end ones.

Would that lake start to fill up?

How might the strip convert to a locals paradise?

What else could happen?

i would donate my rebate check if they would-take the r+d money from the oil companies and give it to the airlines for jet fuel- force the way to greedy banks to refi the home mortgage so you don't have to file bankruptcy and thus have money for vacation-have the way to greedy casinos un squeeze those pay tables so you can win a few bucks-have the israelies bomb iran's nuke plant-get all buffets back to 9.95. ok life is good everyone is working,game on!

Nevada and its pandering politicians share a big part of the blame for the current energy driven problems. They have been sabotaging nuclear power for a generation because of Yucca Mountain.
Perhaps when their constituents start paying a price for their nimby hysteria, some sort of commonsense will start to prevail.

Eric

JMT, here's a possible scenario.

Needless to say, gas prices will continue to rise ... I hear $10 a gal within the next five years is a very strong possibility.

That will cause people to do less driving and prices of all commodities to increase across the board.

We will all be spending much less in an effort to eat and pay our mortgages and our taxes. And we'll be spending more time at home on our computers and less time in the expensive Hollywood productions eating $8 bags of popcorn and $4 cups of Coca-Cola.

Las Vegas will suffer a great deal with fewer visitors but will make an attempt to attract more out of towners with lower hotel room rates, cheaper meals, and attractive "come-ons" and maybe even a better chance to win at Keno.

I think that Las Vegas may be in for some pretty difficult times but this simply means that we will be offered better deals and that alone will keep their heads above water. They will sweat but they will survive for the most part.

I don't know what affect a lower visitor count will have on the Lake Mead water level though, but I bet you that there is someone who knows how many visitors and how much time it takes to decrease that level by one inch or one foot or more.

I'd wanna know that if I was responsible for alloting that water to the states who rely on it for survival.

That's a good question - How many LV visitors over how long a period of time does it take to cause the lake to drop 12 inches in depth during the summer dry seasons? And how much rain over how long a period of time would it take to replenish that 12 inches of water? And just how long will it take to get the lake back up to it's "original level" where it cascades over the flood gates of Hoover Dam?

And if the lake continues to drop as it has in the past ten years, how long will it take to completely dry up or simply shrink to a babbeling brook?

And it that ever does happens, what would happen to Los Angeles and all the rest of us who rely on all that water to survive and wash our socks

Some high powered water supervising expert must know this stuff?

And then again - maybe not!

I'm not sure about the tourist. If locals get laid off from casinos and leave town, that would help the lake grow too. There's probably a formula for that too.

I suspicion that most of us here on many of these message boards are somewhat comped if not completely, rooms, and some meals..We are..
Airfare and the gambling money is what burns my tail! Gambling, I expect to lose. Airfare is fast becoming obscene. I am somewhat older and can spend the money rather than give it to my kids but I would rather spend it on my kids, gambling, and whatever, than on high airfare fuel! What can Las Vegas offer me above what I receive from my Casino/Hotel already?...

Good point irish. If you are cutting back around the house on food, gas, entertainment, etc., and airlines are cutting back on service and raising fares, and hotels are laying off employees...

If the casinos continued to offer the same thing they offered you previously, would you consider that as a bonus because they did not cut your benefits?

hillary wants the oil companys to pay the states gas taxes thus saving you,i don't know how much,at the pump

NO ONE tells the oil companies what or how to do anything.

But if the oil companies want to be nice and abide by some politicial wishes, they'll simply do so at their own discretion and then raise the price at the pump to gain back any amount of money that they had previously lost as a result of any political agreement.

sorry, bit my tongue instead!

Newsweek dot com has an article on how Las Vegas is no longer recesssion proof, because they've diversified and now achieve a larger percentage of income from non-gambling sources.

guess gambling is recession proof, shopping/drinking/eating is not.

They don't mention in the article how Vegas has also become increasingly unfriendly/unwelcoming to the "average" gambler.

I hate to be the one with aq different idea, but a less crowded travelscape, seems to be favorable, at least in the short term.
I'm not worried about the survival of Las Vegas. Las vegas will survive, it may change, it may become a lesser destination after compitition heats up for your vacation dollar, but it will survive.
I'm more concerned about a boat that takes 270 gallons to fill the tank! LOL Do the math on that one at $8 a gallon! But people are still buying boats! People will continue to go to Vegas.
What I'd like to see is the BS about Ethonol dropped, and have them (farmers) back to growing food! The grain used to fill the tank of a Hybred SUV one time, would feed a person for a year! That's a statistic they (ethonol pushers) don't share in those comericials. I'd like to see the US get back to producing something! If feeding the world gives us an edge, so be it!
M2C

Will the new Vegas movies give the city a boost?

I was going to put this in a seperate topic, but I could put it here.

They are still building mega centers, they are still building night clubs, they are still building condos that are not affordable to the average Joe. What would it take for these ultra lounge wanna be movie stars to stop paying outrageous cover charges and outrageous bottle service fees? What will it take to say, "okay, we just about have enough multi million dollar high rise condos with 800 sq feet of space?