经济学人下载:来欧洲的维加斯下注吧

Business.
商业。

Gambling in Spain.
在西班牙赌博。

Place your bets on Euro Vegas.
来欧洲的维加斯下注吧。

Madrid and Barcelona seek a jobs jackpot from a giant gambling resort.
马德里和巴塞罗那从赌场巨头寻求工作"大奖"。

IT MAY just be the single largest contrarian bet in the euro zone. Sheldon Adelson, a casino tycoon, is expected soon to choose between Madrid and Barcelona for a ?16 billion ($21 billion) gambling resort. The euro-zone turmoil does not faze him: "It will take us four to five years," he told Forbes magazine. "By then everything will be solved." Mr Adelson's Las Vegas Sands (LVS) hopes to create a "Euro Vegas", capable of attracting the 1 billion people who live in the 50 countries within a five-hour flight from Spain. He chose the country because of the weather and because its unemployment rate, now at 23%, "assures us the support of the government".
这也许是欧元区单笔最大且不同寻常的赌注。赌场大亨谢尔登?阿德尔森将在马德里和巴塞罗那中间选择一个城市作为一项总值160亿欧元（210亿美元）赌城的地址。欧元区的混乱局面并没有让他担忧。他接受福布斯杂志采访时表示"我们只需要四到五年，到那时一切问题都会解决的。"阿德尔森先生旗下的拉斯维加斯金沙集团（LVS）希望创建一个"欧洲的维加斯"，从而吸引距西拔牙五小时飞行距离以内的50个国家的10亿人口。他选择这个国家是因为当地气候条件好，而且当地失业率现在高达23%，"这让我们确信会得到政府的支持" 。

The numbers are certainly eye-popping . LVS would invest ?6 billion in a first phase to build four hotel strips-eventually reaching 12-as well as casinos, shops, restaurants, golf courses and convention centres. LVS says the project could create 260,000 indirect and direct jobs, enough for nearly half the unemployed in Madrid. Spain is already the fourth-largest holiday destination in the world, but LVS reckons Euro Vegas would attract 11m new tourists on top of the 57m a year Spain already gets, increasing tourism spending by ?15.5 billion over the next ten to 15 years.
数目着实让人瞠目。拉斯维加斯金沙集团一期投资达60亿欧元，用于建设四处酒店区，最终会扩大至12处，同样还会修建赌场，商场，饭店，高尔夫球场和会议中心。拉斯维加斯金沙集团表示这个项目将会直接或间接增加260000个就业岗位，几乎可使马德里一半的失业人员就业。西拔牙本就是世界第四大度假胜地，但拉斯维加斯金沙集团估计在西拔牙原有的570万游客的基础上会吸引110万新游客，未来十到十五年里，旅游收入将会增加155亿欧元。

Madrid and Barcelona, used to battling it out on the football pitch, have won a promise of neutrality from the central government. Barcelona admits that Madrid has the edge so far, since it has been talking to Mr Adelson on and off since 2007. But Barcelona has not given up. Mr Adelson recently visited a beach-front site near the city's El Prat airport , which like Madrid's Barajas has plenty of spare capacity.
马德里和巴塞罗那过去常在足球场上较量，这次中央政府保证不偏不倚。巴塞罗那承认马德里目前有优势，因为自从2007年以来马德里就断断续续地和阿德尔森先生洽谈。但是巴塞罗那并没有放弃。阿德尔森最近访问了巴塞罗那埃尔普拉特国际机场附近的海滨地区，这里和马德里巴拉哈斯一样有大量空地。

National and local leaders are keen on the project but opponents are sceptical of LVS's claims about job creation, and worry that the casino will become a "fiscal and legal paradise" of tax breaks and exemptions from labour laws-a charge which regional officials deny. However, LVS is thought to be seeking a relaxation of Spain's ban on smoking in public places, and lower gambling levies. Whichever city won would also have to bear the cost of such things as transport links to the resort.
中央和地方领导人对这个项目都很热心，但是反对者对拉斯维加斯金沙集团宣称的促进就业深表怀疑，并且担心赌场将会成为劳动法中税收减免的"金融和合法天堂"，地方官员否认这一说法。然而，人们认为拉斯维加斯金沙集团正寻求使西班牙政府放松在公共场所吸烟的禁令，并降低赌场的税收。不论是那座城市获胜，都得承担如连接赌城的交通费用。

Given Spain's precarious public finances, and considering that, as Mr Adelson puts it, there are "tens of billions to be made" from the resort, the authorities ought to resist any temptation to splash out taxpayers' money to win the deal. They will have to assuage public fears of encouraging gambling addiction, infiltration by organised crime and the environmental impact of such a giant construction project. As in Singapore, where LVS recently opened a big casino resort, Spanish officials play down gambling as a small part of the overall package.
考虑到西班牙的深陷危机的公共财政，而且正如阿德尔森声称的那样赌城可以盈利数百亿元 ，当局应该抵挡住大肆挥霍纳税人钱的诱惑，赢得这个协议。当局需要安抚大众，减轻对大众赌博上瘾，犯罪集团渗透以及如此巨大的工程项目造成环境冲击的担忧。西班牙官员们轻描淡写，称赌博只是总体计划中的一小部分，这和新加坡政府如出一辙。最近拉斯维加斯金沙集团在新加坡新开了赌城。

Another worry is that the project will not happen at all. Spain has had its share of unrealised property developments. A ?17 billion casino complex in the desert of Aragon, proposed in 2007, remains unbuilt. But LVS has withstood the global downturn pretty well, and the success of its Macao and Singapore operations gives it plenty of financial firepower. LVS boasts that its Marina Bay Sands development has "moved the needle" in Singapore, with record tourism figures one year after its opening. Euro Vegas would be much larger. A casino resort may lack the prestige of, say, a technology cluster, but Spain will have to take a few gambles to get its soaring unemployment under control.
另一部人担心这一项目根本不会实现。西班牙也曾经有过烂尾楼。2007提议的建在亚拉贡沙漠市值达170亿欧元的赌城最后并没有修建。但是全球经济滑坡时拉斯维加斯金沙集团成功地承受住了压力，而且澳门和新加坡分公司的成功给予其巨大的金融实力。拉斯维加斯金沙集团夸耀新加坡滨海湾金沙酒店盈利蒸蒸日上，开业一年后接待游客数突破历史记录。欧洲维加斯规模将会更大。赌城也许没有如科技城所有的声望，但是西班牙将不得不博几把，控制住飙升的失业率。