Las Vegas will witness the opening of a new hotel-casino at The Strip. The Resort World Las Vegas casino recently opened applications for 6k jobs available in its premises which were filled by 85k applicants.

The tourism economy is in the doldrums

The casino is set to open in summer, at a time when the tourism industry is facing problems because of the pandemic. Several people have lost jobs while others are facing furloughs. At a time like this, the casino opened a hiring process for 6,000 jobs on its premises for which 85,000 people have applied. This means that there are 14 applicants for every job available at the property.

Lori Calderon, executive director of talent acquisition and community engagement at Resorts World, announced last fall that hiring will open in early December. She encouraged people to create a profile on the company’s website. The site allowed users to search for job titles and connect with a virtual recruiter. People started applying for different jobs, from card dealer to locksmith.

Resorts World Las Vegas president Scott Sibella said last fall that the 3,500-room property will open in the summer, regardless of the situation of the pandemic. He said,

“We hope COVID is behind us. If COVID isn’t behind us, we hope it is less restricted. But we’re opening next summer either way.”

The economy is damaged

Speaking to a local newspaper, Jeremy Aguero from Applied Analysis said that the huge number of applications shows the amount of damage done by the pandemic to the state’s economy. He noted that the state needs to do a lot of healing. In December last year, Nevada reported about 300,700 leisure and hospitality jobs which were 14% lower than December 2019.

The loss of tourism income and crippling businesses are the reasons behind this job slump. Ever since the coronavirus related shutdowns started in March 2020, the McCarran International Airport has lost 29 million passengers. Resorts remained empty because of a lack of conferences and conventions.