Where can you find hotel rooms for $20/night?

Perhaps in Zimbabwe - I don't know - but also in... Las Vegas. An article at the Guardian today describes the city's extreme bad fortune in building a new multi-billion dollar CityCenter complex just as the national economy is collapsing.

After a quarter of a century of phenomenal growth, Las Vegas has come to a shuddering halt. The seemingly endless supply of gamblers has dried up. So has the conference trade, hardly helped by a warning from President Barack Obama that bailed-out Wall Street banks should avoid "taking junkets to Las Vegas" on the taxpayers' dime.

Always good value, Vegas hotels have had to slash their room rates by 30% to fill beds. Downtown casinos are offering rates of barely $20 a night, while the four-star Las Vegas Hilton, where Barry Manilow is a resident performer, is offering rooms for as little as $39.

At those rates, you could win enough each day at the video poker machines to live in Las Vegas for free...