Why do so many people live in Vegas, geographically?

Question

Its a question asked in my Geography course... and I have no idea, because I've never been out of the country... All I know is that it's in the middle of a desert. How did it get there?

Answer 1

the Spaniards had a small town there, because it had water, and most of the rest of Nevada didn't.

professional criminals ( from chicago) wanted to be able to make lots of money (with less crime,)  launder money, and eventually get out of crime altogether.

so one of them (Bugsy Siegal) went to Vegas and started a casino -  since gambling was  legal there.

the story is told in some detail in the second year of the TV story CRIME STORY.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Las_Vegas,_...

Answer 2

Good question. Las Vegas was established as a city in 1905. At the time, it only had 5,000 people. Now, it's a large city of about 2,000,000. Las Vegas is a Sp;anish word meaning the meadows. Although it's in the desert, it was named by Spanish explorers who noticed watered meadows while exploring the area. In the early 1900s, casinos and gambling became legal in Nevada. During the GReat Depression in the 1930s, Vegas grew as the result of people being hired to construct Hoover Dam. Over the last few decades, Vegas has been the fastest growing city in the U.S. In the late 90s, over 5,000 people were moving there every month! This was during the great economic expansion of the 90s, when Vegas was expanding rapidly in the tourist and gaming sectors. Many of the posh hotel casinos on the Strip were built then, thus creating many jobs. Many other people moved to Vegas for the cheap cost of living, the sunny weather, and the lack of a state income tax. The number of visitors to Vegas also grew rapidly. Due to the recent economic problems facing our country, i think the number of people moving to and visiting Vegas is starting to slow down. However, Vegas needs to deal with the problems of rapid growth because the city is expected to run out of water in 10 years.

Do you read National Geographic? There's an issue in 1997 about Las Vegas. It's called Believing Las Vegas. It's a good article. You can probably find it at your local library or a used bookstore.

Answer 3

read this bit of history.

http://www.lvol.com/lvoleg/hist/lvhist.h...

i know that many people choose to live there now because cost of living is low compared to other states.

Answer 4

The reason so many people live there NOW is that there are a lot of jobs there. You can have a high school diploma or less, and get a decent paying job at a casino.

As for why a town was founded there in the first place, it seems that it started as a railroad town (the beginning of many large towns in the West).