Looking forward, industry analysts see as many as 20,000 jobs created by the New Jersey online gambling market centered in Atlantic City. The globally recognized and popular boardwalk casinos manage the state-sanctioned websites which deliver cyber casinos and poker to Garden State residents. And as of May 1, any new job created by this young but growing industry, and all future jobs, is required to be located inside that state. This includes all platform providers involved in any aspect of the New Jersey Internet gambling offerings, including but not limited to fraud detection, customer service, website management and geolocation verification.
New Jersey launched its cyber gambling websites back in late November of last year, and up until April’s numbers have shown increased revenue every month. Now any jobs created are mandated to be staffed by New Jersey residents, and when lumped together with licensing fees and tax revenue, the new jobs are simply one more benefit offered by state-run online gambling. Previous to New Jersey launching its own Internet gambling websites, non-US companies have offered, and continue to deliver, legitimate cyber wagering Atlantic City poker rooms, casinos and sportsbooks to US and international gamers. Currently, New Jersey is allowing just poker and casino games in its state government-sanctioned gambling websites.
The authorized NJ Internet gaming sites are run by the following firms: Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa, Caesars Interactive Entertainment New Jersey (Affiliate of Bally’s Park Place), Caesars Interactive Entertainment (Affiliate of Boardwalk Regency Corporation), Golden Nugget Atlantic City, Tropicana Casino and Resort, Trump Plaza Associates and Trump Taj Mahal Associates. Currently, a total of 16 different websites are managed by those Atlantic City casino hotels. Caesars Interactive runs five New Jersey gambling sites, Borgata manages three virtual properties, and the GoldenNugget, Trump Taj Mahal and Tropicana Casino each offer two different gambling websites. While cyber revenue slumped slightly in April, overall land and web-based gambling created a much needed increase over the previous month.
In the traditional sense, casino jobs were obviously restricted to the requirement of a physical presence. Dealers, cocktail servers, hospitality staff and other casino employees had to be physically located near a casino to travel to and from work. But with the cyber casinos of the World Wide Web, no such restrictions were required. New Jersey smartly added a provision for physical job presence when it passed legal online gambling legislation last year. This ensures that New Jersey residents will continue to benefit from any job growth that the industry provides.
William J. Pascrell III is a lobbyist in New Jersey who pushed for Internet gambling, as he believes it will benefit the state for years to come. He pointed out that NJ “has already elapsed Nevada and Delaware’s markets,” referring to both Internet player volume and revenue. In his mind, New Jersey could become the hub of the United States Internet gambling industry, as there are still only three separate states which have decided to set up and manage state-sanctioned web gambling options. To further the goal of New Jersey as a major industry player, Senator Jim Whelan is co-sponsoring a bill which would allow non-US companies from around the world to operate in the state. NJ is also looking toward interstate agreements with others that pass Internet gambling legislation in the future.