From Steel to Slots: Casino Capitalism in the Post Industrial City

Abstract

The turn of the twenty-first century witnessed the decline of much of what was left of industrial America. Social changes, along with new innovations, together transformed the old structure based on industrial output into a system based more on information and service. This transformation occurred in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, where a tsunami of casino capitalism overtook the city and the decayed Bethlehem Steel site. For those of us who lived there at that time, it was easy to feel overwhelmed. The change was far and away more than those caught up in it could comprehensively see, study, analyze, or recount.