For the first time since assimilation and relocation, Native people are seeing real economic growth, and tribes can take sole responsibility (and recognition) for this development. From the Bingo hall and pull-tab days of the 1980s to today's destination casino resorts, Indian gaming has directly generated dollars for tribes, delivering some from decades of abject poverty. Gaming has provided for some tribes in ways that federal project-based job creation programs never could. Payoffs have included maintainable gains in employment, healthcare, education, and independence — results a well-meaning federal government hoped to bear but, with its forceful hand and ignorant approach, didn't.
This kind of growth — noted by improvements to existing programs, and the creation of new opportunities and reinvestments made by and for tribes — is success. Gaming has wrought these benefits, unrealized before, but the truth is Natives remain disproportionately poorer than any race in the United States. Gaming has allowed participating tribes to make strides. In 2002, only 41 of 330 gaming tribes could account for 65% of total gaming revenue, while 180 tribes (of the 330 that gamed) could only account for 10% of the revenue (Kalt and Singer, Myths and Realities of Tribal Sovereignty 37-38). That gap — 12% of gaming tribes seeing big gains to 55% seeing very modest gains (not to mention the 33% in the middle) — shows that "gaming-derived income ... is highly concentrated in a relatively small number of tribes" (Kalt and Singer, Myths and Realities of Tribal Sovereignty 37).
In a 2003 Indian Country Today article, reporter Tom Wanamaker wrote that the 330 gaming tribes generated $14.5 billion in 2002, a 14% increase from 2001's $12.8 billion. But he questioned the industry's ability to maintain double-digit growth, in part due to growing opposition — "Indian bashing" — by anti-gaming and anti-Indian groups. He also wrote that gaming tribes are being hit up for larger contributions by states experiencing budget crises. But tribes that game presumably do so to rescue their own financial situation, which is in a greater state of hurt than that of local and federal governments'. Clearly, there is a disconnect — Harvard University professor Joseph P. Kalt acknowledged this in remarks he prepared for a 1998 presentation to the National Gambling Impact Study Commission:
"I am continually struck by the extent to which public perception of the impact of gaming in Indian Country is colored by the phenomenal financial success of a tiny handful of tribes. ... Media's attention to these cases obscures the facts that only about one-third of the nation's 550+ tribes have any gaming operations at all, and that for every highly visible, well-run, well-capitalized casino, there are many more tribal operations that are modest enterprises providing employment and income in low-volume, rural markets."
As Northern California Coast Miwok tribal chief Greg Sarris told Los Angeles Times reporter Eric Bailey in 2003, "As long as a tribe is poor, were OK to the rest of the world. The minute you get empowered ... you're a wagon burner."
But Indian gaming — regardless of its unrealized duration, greedy external interests, or public backlash — will remain a true measure of success for a very obvious, very basic reason: it honors our sovereignty. In her 2004 testimony before the Senate's Select Committee on Indian Affairs, Harvard University researcher Katherine A. Spilde said that because tribes initiate gaming ("rather than having it imposed upon them"), they are exercising their sovereignty to opt-in and use gaming as a venture — "one they must fully fund and develop, assuming all costs and risks themselves."
As tribes opt in, they gain federal support from the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (1998), which intends to promote tribal sovereignty, regulate gaming practices, and monitor the redistribution of revenue. The rules of the Act are in sync with the concept of Nation building — as tribes are required by the Act to govern their gaming industries, their own governments might become stronger and other tribal affairs might receive better management. Certainly, stronger tribal governments are marks of success, so it must also be noted that Indian gaming is not just an economic issue, but also very much a political one. Gaming brings in dollars, but dollars cannot build good tribal governments; a good tribal government, however, can put gaming dollars to work. It can allow for the creation of new (sometimes related) business ventures, such as hotels, restaurants, travel plazas, etc., and it can have a much wider reach. Reporter Tom Wanamaker wrote: “Gaming tribes with deepening pockets have indeed joined the ranks of special interest groups, lobbying politicians and making contributions to candidates they support” (Economics Special, Indian Country Today). Indian gaming has helped give voice to a severely underrepresented (indigenous) population — votes sanctioned by gaming tribes even help non-gaming tribes get recognition they might not otherwise have had.
Responsible Indian gaming has led to enterprising economic and social systems for tribes at a time when the U.S. federal government is seeing unprecedented levels of joblessness, economic decline, and topsy-turvy politicking. Researcher Spilde calls Indian gaming “the most successful nation- and economy-building strategy in American history.” Not knowing how long gaming success will last, it would be wise of us to use its capital gains to make ourselves stronger so we fare better in the nation’s uncertain future.
Works Cited
Bailey, Eric. “Tribe’s Plans for a Casino Shake Up Sonoma County.” Los Angeles Times. 11 Jun. 2003.
Kalt, Joseph P. Statement Before the National Gambling Impact Study Commission. 16 Mar. 1998.
Kalt, Joseph P., and Joseph William Singer. “Myths and Realities of Tribal Sovereignty: The Law and Economics of Indian Self-Rule.” Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government Faculty Research Working Papers Series. Harvard University. March 2004.
Spilde, Katherine A. Hearing on S. 519, the Native American Capital Formation and Economic Development Act of 2003. Testimony before the Select Committee on Indian Affairs, United States Senate. 21 Jul. 2004.
Wanamaker, Tom. “Economics Special: Indian Gaming is Healthy and Growing.” Indian Country Today. 5 Sept. 2003.
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