By: Jonathan Sohn - Las Vegas. The land of cheap food, free drinks (not counting the green chip tip to your favorite cocktail waitress of course), cheap hotel rooms, and of course, bountiful prostitues/hookers/call girls/escorts…

In 1975!

Alas, that is no longer the case. Back in the day, when the mob ran things, they treated their customers well with cheap food, cheap sleeps and cheap whoretainment. But now that the real mob, otherwise known as corporate conglomerates run the places, they’ve discovered that they can charge more for crap, and people will still flock to the city hoping to become the next world series of poker champion annoyingly loud spectator.

Ah, Vegas has changed from the good ole days (not to say that I actually remember what the good ole days were like, since the first time I went to vegas was circa 2k1), but I’ve heard stories of people who would go there, sleep for a couple nights, eat buffets for five bucks and then leave (making sure not to gamble), having spent a grand total of 20 bucks (with 2 extra bucks for gas - it used to be all cheap like that).

Now, the casinos charge more if for no other reason than they need someone to pay for all of the features that you’ll never see once you walk up to a craps table. I mean, other people might enjoy the lights of the strip, the fabulous view of the aladdin’s topless pool from atop the eiffel tower (yay quarter-binoculars!), but for me, you could just put a craps table in the middle of the parking garage, and I’d be cool. But for everyone (including lowly me playing $3 craps in the basement of some dude’s house), we now have to pay upwards of a hundred bucks+ for a hotel room, more than 30 bucks for a buffet, and close to 400 for a good time case of genital warts.

Every hotel is getting bigger and better, and more expensive. But there’s an interesting thing happening because of this. There are now so many rooms, that hotels are finding out that people can actually… (gasp) shop around. That being said, some hotels are finding that they cannot sell out every night charging 500 bucks for a bed and a sink, and thus, prices are going back down. Soon, places will be advertising that they have cheaper prices on their buffets and cheaper prices for the rooms, and glory days will be here once again! Of course, if that happens, there will probably be $100 minimums for all the table games, so, c’est la vie.

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