Wanna’ Bet?

By Don Kuehn

This is not a lecture on the morals of gambling. I don’t care how you spend your discretionary entertainment money. It is a warning that gambling has become so pervasive that it has snared millions (including the students in your classrooms) in its grip and could stand between you and your long-term savings goals.

The expansion of gambling from Vegas-style casinos to Indian casinos, riverboats and "cruises to nowhere," slot machines and video poker, sports books, lotteries, Keno, horse and dog tracks, and now online games paid with credit card debt, has created significant social problems in this country.

Two decades ago, only two states had legal gambling and 48 states outlawed it. Today it is just the opposite: only Hawaii and Utah have no recognized legal gambling.

Eleven states now have commercial casinos; 28 have Indian casinos; 40 states and the District of Columbia have lotteries; 43 have pari-mutuel wagering (dog and horse tracks); 47 states and D.C. allow "charitable gaming" (bingo, raffles and the like) and 35 allow electronic gaming devices like video poker and slot machines. In 2003, it all added up to a "gross gambling revenue" (wagers minus payouts) of more than $27 billion from casinos and $72.9 billion from all gambling, according to the American Gaming Association.

Although all types of gambling are controversial in some circles, Internet gambling may be more so because, although illegal in many states, operators can circumvent the law and state regulators by going "offshore." Some experts also contend that Internet games encourage compulsive, addictive behavior that can wreak havoc on family finances. Before the advent of online games, people had to make a conscious decision to gamble. They had to get dressed, travel to a casino and probably stop at the ATM for their "seed money."

Today you can sit in front of your computer in your underwear, enter your credit card number and clean out the family bank account before breakfast.

According to Keith Whyte, executive director of the National Council on Problem Gambling in Washington, D.C., the average "problem" gambler has 14 to 16 credit cards and owes friends and family members thousands of dollars. "Where a cocaine addict might be able to go through $1,000 in drugs in a night, for a gambler that’s just one hand of blackjack," he says.

Okay, it’s not you. You don’t have a problem, right? Well, take a look at the faces in your classroom. In 1999, an estimated 7.9 million children and adolescents had problem or pathological gambling addictions. Take your average NFL stadium. Fill it to capacity with teenagers. Fill it again and again. Do it 100 times and that’s about how many kids have an addictive problem with gambling in the United States.

Several studies have shown adolescent pathological gambling is associated with alcohol and drug use, truancy, low grades and illegal activities to finance gambling habits. Kids whose parents gambled excessively had twice the number of problems with the law and twice the attempted suicide rate of their classmates.

Henry Lesieur of Illinois State University, along with other social science experts, estimate that 6 percent to 8 percent of youngsters ages 13 to 17 are problem gamblers. One in 10 high school students reports committing illegal acts to get money for gambling or to pay gambling debts.

Research indicates that adolescents are about three times more likely to become problem gamblers than adults and are especially susceptible to video gambling because of their familiarity with video games’ vivid action, graphics, speed and anonymity. Video poker machines and Internet sites don’t care how old you are.

And behind it all, of course, whether it’s you or a member of your family, is money … your money. C’mon, you’re smart enough to know the odds are always in favor of the house. That’s how they can afford to build those flashy, splashy neon casinos.

Saving for legitimate goals, like college for your kids or your first house or retirement, is difficult enough. Slipping into potentially addictive behaviors like casino or online gambling only shoves attainment of those goals beyond your grasp.