The locals pass is only good weekdays and on weekends after 2, they’re purely filler to keep the parks busy when fewer tourists are actually in the parks. The restaurants and bars likely don’t make profit without them.
Disney knows they’re “less” profitable than non locals but they still result in profits.
Not a good sign for Disney. APs in their eyes don't generate as much revenue as someone staying at Pop or Riverside with a four or five day park hopper. Any time they cater to AP's, it always feels like they are starting to struggle financially. That and their promotion for up to 20% off VIP tours in the summer.
Let’s remember that Florida is large, and many FL pass holders live 3-4 hours away.
The “less profitable” idea may or may not apply to some in the immediate Orlando area. If they are showing up at night regularly to drink at a bar, and not bothering with Ratatouille, that’s profitable.
When we drive up from Fort Lauderdale, we are still staying on property (almost always) and dining, etc.
When we went from 3-4 day passes to AP’s, our total spend never went down. We just had more to spend on extras.
When we started getting significant points from our Chase Disney Visa, our total spend went up, because we’ll eat at Toppolino’s, Jiko, or Cali Grill and rarely bother with QS. We are as or more profitable than the average tourist from another state, and we’ll go more frequently than most. (I said most, you know who you are.

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What did go down was us clogging up queues. We’ve done everything. If something is a walk-on or 10 minute wait, we’ll do it.