Hi Everyone:

IN my Publisher's Note for our July Magazine I offer some interesting statistics from the WSOP. Here's a link to my note:

https://www.twoplustwo.com/magazine/issue175/

Hopefully we can get some discussion going.

Best wishes,
Mason

I recently went and played a session of 1-2 nlhe. They raked about a dollar a hand on average. How many people do you think win more than $1 per hand in cash games?

Rake isn’t fun, but it’s no more fun in cash games than tournaments, and your dislike of tournaments doesn’t make it so.

They should offer some form of raskeback imo

Obviously you don't read our magazine. For if you did, you would have read what I wrote in our June issue:

https://www.twoplustwo.com/magazine/issue174/

Also, I'm curious where you find games for which the rake averages $1 per hand.

Mason

Just as well the poker economy has become so good rake isn't really an issue any more.

I assume that this is a slight jab at Negreanu, being the raskel he is, but realistically many places running poker in their casino may not be looking at it in a way to build, maintain or sustain any type of poker economy, so the diskonnect may be believing that the needs of the rooms match the needs of the player in that regard.

Maybe a mod or admin could fix the title typo to cut down on the trolling.

As for the question at hand, I think that LV as a whole has abandoned the "loss leader" philosophy. I'm old enough to remember when strip casinos would offer hotel and meal deals to get people to come to play. Bob Stupak's deals were a Sunday paper regular ad. What happened is that Steve Wynn and finally others realized only a small minority actually would be deterred from coming by higher prices. Those that were deterred weren't coming anyway because gambling opportunities are now available almost everywhere. So why not at least break even or start making a profit.

I don't think today that casino executives care whether poker lives or dies. I agree that it is bad for the game as a whole. However, nobody today mourns the loss of Farro games. I don't think they're mourn the loss of poker, either.

Your point is only valid if they take $1 per hand per player. DUCY?

-BD

They could advertise live poker a lot better, things can be done to make "old" games MORE exciting for recs or more profitable for regs. But which casino wants to shot itself on the leg? I'd rather encourage my gamblers to play slots and other stuff and hide the poker as much as I could, hiring amateur dealers etc. Thats what I see in most of the European casinos.
(from business perspective)

Decreasing rake is very unlikely.

I think he was saying it did work out to about $1 per hand per player.

Well it wasn't clear that he was saying that and even Mason's response was questioning the rake amount. I also doubt that RIO is raking $8-9 per hand and I would guess that a 1-2 NL games would be at max capacity pretty much always. The math just doesn't work.

-BD

I can't speak to the Rio, but many $1-2 games in Las Vegas are nine handed and rake 10% up to $5 + "jackpot/promo rake" $1 right away +$1 more. I expect that the average for contested pots is pretty high, near the max of $7 per hand.

That would be almost $.75 per contested hand. If there are say 16 contested hands per hour, that is about $12/hr, an action game could rake about $15 per player per hour.

The worst development locally has been the obsessive focus on many promo offerings concurrently, whci are raked/taxed/funded at a minimum of $1 per hand whenever there is a flop.

Its all about demand and supply. Average player is not capable of understanding how rake effects their win/loss rate. Average person is not capable of boycotting a casino increasing their rake so why not increase the rake for more profit then?

I hate the fact that now there are no more rebuy MTT's(re entry with rake instead) and rake free add on being removed.(previously without rake but now raked)

This topic can be extended to many other subjects including taxes/price increases for products and services etc.

Conclusion is that unless people are educated and smart they wont be fighting for their rights and some smart poker players will have to pay extra in order to be able to play in the better games.(thank you triton for getting me to pay %6.5 rake in huge buy ins but nothing i can do about it)

In many rooms, Omaha in its various forms does not participate in promotions and does not involve a jackpot drop.

The rake is governed by equilibrium and that's pretty much the end of it.

Over/Under on what what percentage of this thread will contain posts from Caesar's shill accounts?

Hi Gzesh:

Just so everyone knows, what you have written here is correct. Also, in limit games, since the hands often play faster, a little more per hour is often dropped.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi A_C:

Someone named Sejin Park won the Colossus and got $451,000. I bet he was thrilled. I wonder if he knew $852,000 had been raked away.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi Mason,

I read your article. Thanks for educating those of us that do not play live (and those that do) with your wisdom. That really sucks for the players! Then taxes taken out on top of that if they live in the USA.

Best wishes.

xoxoxo

really the rake problem translates across the board in america and probably every other 1st world country . its just too difficult to educate enough of the middling people in a society to combat the effectiveness of that all mighty corporate environment. as long as there is air conditioning , junk food , and internet no one is gonna do ****. lol.

life is becoming unbeatable for the rake lol.

I don’t understand how it’s useful to compare total rake to the amount of money the winner took home. If this is your issue, the casino could solve it by just making the pay-out more top heavy. The more appropriate exercise would be to compare total rake to a reasonable estimate of the casino’s costs to run the tournament.

That's setting yourself up for failure , you'd never get an honest estimate. That equation you just mention is the reason the majority of people can't make a decent Living.

As I said earlier - the goal of the professional (making a living) is not necessarily the same goal as those running poker rooms or poker tournaments. Those goals may co-exist for a while (particularly during a boom period for the industry), but they are not by definition cooperative agendas. There are limits. If a place charged $300 rake to play a $100 tournament then there would be no entries.

I would suggest the reason more people cannot make a living is that the games are tougher and a smaller percentage of players are capable of being good enough to make a living at it compared to 10+ years ago, and many players do not recognize properly where they are on the food chain, nor do what they need (or they lack the inherent ability) to move up it as well.

Capitalism and the philosophy of rake as much as the market will bear.

Back in the 80's all the dealers had quarters (coins) in their bank because rake was in increments of 25/50 cents.

If one casino raised the rake they ran the risk of players leaving to a poker room with lower rake.

Now many Native American casinos don't have competition nearby and can rake $6 a hand or more because there isn't another game in town. Underground poker rooms in NYC can rake as much as $25 per hand and if the players don't like it they don't have to play in that room.

If the Vegas poker rooms wanted to compete for players they might start with adjusting the rake and see how that affects their bottom line. More players = more profit.

Right. AND: in many rooms, it’s only NLHE and lowest-limit-LHE that are raked for jackpots and high hand **** and the like. So in addition to Omaha, a lot of LHE-above-10/20 will probably be promotion-rake-free, and so will all stud and mix games.

If you’re playing anything regularly besides NLHE or low-limit LHE in a public cardroom, you should press management for your game to be exempt from jackpot and promotion rake if it isn’t already. It totally changes the game (for the better, obv; higher rake is not, contrary to common opinion, better for the game ).

In the DMV/AC market, poker room managers shrewdly started asking the regulars in the 20/40 LHE and higher games if they wanted to participate in promotions; when the response was an overwhelming “NO!” they exempted the games. This set precedent for the spate of new properties that have opened up and down the East Coast, and it has benefitted the games a great deal.