LAS VEGAS – Here in a mall, blackjack students practiced flipping cards on tables with no players. Nearby, a couple of people leaned over a craps table, the thrill of the game replaced with quiet study as the dice rolled.
At the CEG Dealer School, an academy for would-be casino dealers, the pipeline of workers keen to join Las Vegas’ ailing tourism economy is robust, despite the city having the highest unemployment rate of any major metropolitan area in the United States
Las Vegas is slowly climbing out of a steep hole that is being lifted by tentative reopenings and the introduction of the vaccine. The Las Vegas area’s unemployment rate was 10.5% seasonally adjusted for December, the last month available – the worst of any metropolitan area in the country with a population of more than one million. That’s a significant improvement since the rate hit 34.2% last year. January figures are to be released on Friday.
The leisure and hospitality sector, which used to employ more than a quarter of the region’s non-agricultural workforce, came to a standstill last spring. By January there were around 30% fewer jobs in the leisure and hospitality industry.
Still, laid-off workers are signing up for training at the dealer school, new casinos are opening, and major entertainment events and conventions are planned for this summer. One of the Strip’s most valuable properties, the Venetian Las Vegas and associated assets, has just been sold to private equity investors and a real estate fund for $ 6.25 billion.
