Pennsylvania casinos finished fiscal year 2025–26 with fewer employees and lower spending on outside businesses, even as a new casino joined the market. The changes show how casino expansion can happen alongside staffing cuts at existing properties.
According to figures from the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board’s annual Diversity Report, supplied for this article, the statewide casino workforce totaled 15,242 employees on June 30, 2026. That was down 598 jobs, or about 3.8%, from the previous year.
The report also shows that casinos remained major employers of Pennsylvania residents and continued to direct a significant share of their purchasing toward nearby businesses. It also comes out with a very important deadline looming for skill games in The Keystone State.
Pennsylvania Casinos Employed Fewer Workers
The statewide employment decline came despite the opening of Happy Valley Casino in College Township in April. The new property brought the number of licensed casinos and resorts to 18, up from 17.
Happy Valley ended the fiscal year with 289 employees. With those new positions included, total casino employment still fell by nearly 600. It also experienced a big drop in revenue in June.
Excluding Happy Valley, the other 17 properties collectively employed about 887 fewer people than they did a year earlier. That distinction matters: the statewide total alone does not show the full size of the workforce reduction at existing casinos.
Employment changes were not uniform. Some properties reduced staffing, while others added workers.
Parx remained the largest casino employer in the state. Wind Creek Bethlehem ranked second with 1,589 employees, followed by Rivers Casino Pittsburgh.
Table-games employment also declined. Casinos reported 4,690 table-games employees, compared with 4,933 the previous year—a reduction of 243 positions.
What Could Explain the Decline?
The first thought would be the record year in revenue that Pennsylvania online casinos generated in 2025.
But the PGCB report did not identify one official cause for the statewide job losses. It would therefore be misleading to attribute the entire decline to online gambling, inflation, or any other single factor.
Property-level changes offer part of the picture. Earlier this year, the Casino at Nemacolin reportedly laid off more than 140 employees following an operational review. The operator pointed to changes in room inventory, reduced guest demand, and a need to adjust staffing for long-term stability.
The report also describes pressures from inflation, rising labor costs, tariffs, and supply-chain disruptions. Those conditions can influence hiring and operating decisions, but they do not establish why each casino increased or reduced its workforce.
The decline in table-games staffing is another important finding. Still, the employment numbers alone cannot show whether those reductions resulted from changing customer demand, scheduling changes, or other operational decisions.
The clearest conclusion is that employment fell across existing Pennsylvania casinos, while the reasons varied by property.
Casino Purchasing Also Slowed
Retail casinos spent roughly $753 million with outside businesses during fiscal 2025–26, a decline of nearly 10%.
About 31% of that spending went to local business enterprises. The report defines these as suppliers located in a casino’s host county or a neighboring county.
This purchasing gives casinos an economic role beyond their own payrolls. Local suppliers can benefit from casino contracts even when they do not directly employ casino workers.
Construction-related spending saw a particularly large reduction, falling from approximately $115 million to $61 million. That $54 million decrease accounted for a substantial part of the overall purchasing decline.
However, lower construction spending should not be treated as a direct explanation for the loss of permanent casino jobs. Construction purchasing and casino workforce counts measure different parts of the industry’s economic activity.
Local Hiring and Workforce Diversity
Pennsylvania residents continued to make up most of the casino workforce. Here's a breakdown:
- Of the 15,242 employees reported statewide, 13,786 lived in Pennsylvania—about 90%.
- Racial minorities accounted for approximately 42% of all employees, essentially unchanged from the previous year.
- Representation differed in executive, management, and professional positions. Among the 2,359 employees in those roles:
- Racial minorities held 28% of positions.
- Women held 39% of positions.
These figures help distinguish overall workforce diversity from representation in higher-level roles. A casino can have a diverse workforce while still showing different patterns within management and professional positions.
The PGCB’s Diversity Report tracks employment, diversity-plan implementation, and purchasing practices under Pennsylvania’s Race Horse Development and Gaming Act. Its scope includes spending with local businesses and minority- and women-owned suppliers.
The 2025–26 figures present a mixed picture for Pennsylvania casinos: a new property created jobs, but existing casinos collectively reduced employment, and outside-business spending fell.
The property-by-property results provide a more useful view than treating every casino as part of one statewide trend.
