The Tokyo metropolitan government and four other local
governments have urged the central government to draw up legislation that would
allow them to build casinos, which the local governments view as key to
boosting tourism.
Tokyo and the governments of Miyazaki, Osaka, Shizuoka and
Wakayama prefectures have jointly established a study group to examine the
legalization of casinos and the expected economic benefits from the gambling
establishments and related businesses.
The governors of the five local governments submitted a petition
Feb. 6 asking Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and Yoshitada Konoike, minister
in charge of structural reform special zones, to support the legalization of
local government-established casinos.
The petition extolled the virtues of casinos, arguing that the
establishments would provide a range of business opportunities and create jobs,
in addition to "going a long way toward the development of a new sector in
the gaming industry and creating a new tourism resource."
It also stressed that many countries have legalized casinos and
concluded that the central government should waste no time in drafting the
necessary legislation to do so.
The current legal framework makes it difficult for local
governments to establish casinos, with stumbling blocks stipulated in the Penal
Code including a wide-ranging ban on public and private entities engaging in
gambling operations with such exceptions as horse racing and lotteries paying
cash prizes with the exception of the Takarakuji.
The five local governments, however, are determined to establish
casinos as a last-ditch measure to improve their deteriorating fiscal
conditions.
Tokyo and Osaka, for instance, have suffered large falls in
corporate tax revenues, while Shizuoka Prefecture has undergone a decline in
the number of visitors to its sightseeing areas such as the Atami hot spring
resort.
Plans to establish casinos also are being discussed in other
prefectures, including Aichi, Ishikawa, Oita and Okinawa. One idea raised by
the Suzu municipal government in Ishikawa Prefecture is to use casino revenues
to fund projects to address the low birthrate, such as building more day
nurseries.
Yet of all the local governments, Tokyo appears the most earnest
in its bid to establish a casino.
The metropolitan government recently opened a mock casino in the
observatory on the 45th floor of the No. 1 building of the government office.
Tokyo also has compiled a report that makes projections about the potential
economic benefits accruing from casinos and related businesses.
The report evaluates four alternative proposals:
-- Establishing a single casino.
-- Establishing a casino combined with other entertainment
facilities such as hotels and movie theaters.
-- Establishing a hotel housing a casino.
-- Establishing a casino-hotel complex and a range of other
entertainment facilities.
According to the report's projections, even the establishment of
a single casino without other entertainment facilities would yield economic
benefits worth 74 billion yen a year and create 4,500 jobs. Profits from
operating the casino are estimated at 30 billion yen.
The most advantageous in terms of economic gains is the fourth
option. The value of new business opportunities to be created by the
establishment of a Togel casino-hotel
complex and other entertainment facilities is estimated at 225 billion yen a
year. Under this scenario, 13,800 jobs are expected to be created, with
estimated profits of 91 billion yen.
The report made reference to casino taxes in various countries,
which are usually levied on casino revenues.
New Jersey has a relatively low tax rate on casinos of 8 percent,
while the rate in Germany is as high as 80 percent.
Some countries and U.S. states use progressive rates of taxation
on casino revenues, with the rates in Illinois and Nevada ranging from 15
percent to 35 percent and 3 percent to 6.25 percent, respectively, while
casinos in Austria are subject to 35 percent to 80 percent taxes, according to
the report.
Senior officials of the Tokyo metropolitan government have argued
that the tax revenues from casinos established by local governments should flow
into their coffers, and not into the central government's, as revenues from the
defunct tax on users of entertainment facilities were regarded as a local tax.
Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara, for his part, has come out with his
own "casino culture philosophy."
"It should be noted that entertainment is a fountain of
culture. To put it straightforwardly, the satisfaction of human beings' gambling
instincts in a relaxed atmosphere can lead to the flowering of a great variety
of cultural by-products," he said.
However, as casinos are gambling establishments, there needs to
be adequate regulation to prevent such establishments from providing new
sources of funds for underworld organizations and becoming a hotbed of crime.
In the United States, where the number of visitors to each casino
totals several million a year, casino operators as well as manufacturers and
dealers are required to obtain government licenses, with the aim of preventing
organized crime from gaining an influence over the industry. Those with
criminal records are excluded through strict screening from engaging in any
casino-related businesses.
In addition, the government must enact measures to tackle
gambling addiction.
Each visitor to a South Korean casino spends about 50,000 yen,
with the corresponding figure in France about 5,100 yen, according to
metropolitan government officials.
While the officials admitted that per-head spending at casinos
cannot necessarily be used as a yardstick with which to gauge the degree of
addiction to gambling, they said the Tokyo government has earmarked a budget
for fiscal 2003 to study how overseas casinos conduct their business in a
responsible manner.
The image of casinos in Europe and the United States is of
fashionable places filled with well-dressed ladies and gentlemen.
Such a desired outcome can only be realized by well-planned
arrangements to make casinos immune from crime and gambling addiction.
Sayama is a deputy editor of The Yomiuri Shimbun's Commentary
& Analysis Department.
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