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| | Dealing Poker in Atlantic City | | |      |
By Kaelaine Minton I recently spent about a week at the Taj Majal in Atlantic City, New Jersey, covering the US Poker Championship and I was impressed with the consistency of the dealers I saw there.
Although some dealers were faster than others and some were friendlier than others, they all seemed to use the same mechanics.
I wondered if the Taj provided their own dealer training, similar to what happens at Foxwoods.
In order to get the inside scoop, I had a chat with Michael, a young dealer who was on a break between tournament tables.
Michael had been dealing poker at the Taj for about 18 months and he straightened me out.
Michael attended a poker dealing school in Atlantic City before applying for work at the Taj and said that most dealers follow this same path.
The Taj expects their dealing applicants to already be trained on the mechanics of dealing poker and they only provide training on internal policies and procedures.
(A little research online told me that poker dealer training can be had in the Atlantic City area for anywhere from $400 to $550, made up of about 80 to 100 hours of instruction over a 4 or 5 week period.)Then I moved on to the topic we all want to know about: pay.
In most states, dealers get minimum wage, plus tokes, with perhaps some adjustments for shifts and years of service.
Michael says they earn "waitress pay" of $4/hour.
"Waitress pay" is a less-than-minimum hourly wage paid for service-based jobs where the difference is expected to be made up in tips.
Waitresses (or wait-persons, to be politically correct) are expected to earn a certain amount of income from tips and are therefore paid a lower hourly wage by the employer.
Michael says the poker dealers contractually claim $11 per hour, so that is what they are being taxed on.
Their actual income varies, of course, based on what games they are dealing, hands per hour, the generosity of the players, stakes, and lots of other factors.
All dealers rotate through dealing cash games, tournaments, and sit-and-gos, with the best hourly-rate tokes coming from the sit-and-gos, according to Michael.
Because of the difficulties of getting a gaming work permit from the New Jersey gaming commission, (they are apparently one of the most restrictive in the US) casinos in Atlantic City do not hire temporary dealers during the big tournaments.
The casinos that host the large events therefore have to have trained and licensed staff already on the payroll.
This doesn't seem to be a problem as there was enough poker playing going on at the Taj Majal to keep that poker room going 24-7.
Poker.
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