June 11th, 2023Too many jokers in this deck of cards

says Jeff Glorfeld

AUSTRALIAN online news services have recently carried stories about government efforts to take gambling advertising off the airwaves.
According to one report, Goldstein MP Zoe Daniel introduced a bill to “rid television entirely of advertisements from bookmakers, which have surged in recent years along with the number of players in Australia’s lightly regulated market”.
The news story said there was evidence of “considerable public support for reducing the number of gambling ads”, and it quoted Ms Daniel as saying: “It’s increased by more than 300 per cent in the last 10 or so years, and that is creating a situation where our children are desensitised.”
Two-up and pokies
When we came to Australia in 1985, a common quip we heard was that
Aussies would bet on two flies crawling up a wall. On Anzac Day at The Age there
would usually be a game of two-up in the locker-room, and I was surprised by the
number of my colleagues who took horse racing extremely seriously.
We would sometimes drive for a holiday up to Wahgunyah, in the Rutherglen
wine region, on the south bank of the Murray River, opposite Corowa on the
NSW side, and of an evening we’d walk over the bridge to the bowls club, have a
few drinks and play the pokies.
My wife Carol enjoyed playing. She would allocate an amount to lose and play
until it was gone. I usually enjoyed uncommonly good luck; I would toss in a few
coins, win a couple of small jackpots, and retire to the bar and spend my winnings
on a bottle of good wine.
That was pretty much it for gambling, as far as we were concerned, until
the pokies – and Crown Casino – came to Victoria. I always admired the way
progressive politicians from the local all the way up to the federal levels worked to
limit the number of pokie machines allowed in various communities.
I don’t know if gambling is a disease or simply indicative of a weak character,
but while living in Wheatsheaf we saw first-hand the damage it can cause. When
a friend of ours had to travel overseas for a family emergency, his partner stayed
home, and lost nearly their entire retirement savings playing pokies.
She knew what she was doing, knew how much she’d lost, but simply had no
control over her actions. Apart from the financial difficulties it caused, it left a
permanent scar on their relationship.
Nanny state
Many Australians resent such regulations, decrying what they call the “nanny
state”, but I say good on Australia for trying to put controls on gambling in all its
various formats.
In the US the problem is of a whole different magnitude. Starting in the
1970s, the federal government began granting native American tribes the right to
establish gaming facilities on tribal lands in states where gambling was legal. Today
there are more than 500 such “tribal casinos” in 29 states.
These are in addition to the more than 450 commercial casinos operating
legally across the country. According to reports, native American tribes gaming
gross revenue was $US27.8 billion for the 2020 fiscal year, and the gross gaming
revenue of the gambling industry in the US in 2022 was more than $US60 billion.
In 2021 the sports betting industry in the US reportedly brought in more than $US4 billion. Meanwhile, an estimated 10 million Americans live with a gambling
addiction, and surveys have indicated that as many as 20 million people in the US say their gambling habit interferes with their work and social life.
Media
You might think the media would be full of government-sponsored ads pointing out the damage inflicted upon people by problem gambling, and there would be news stories about politicians making impassioned speeches in support of imposing controls upon the gambling industry.
You’d be wrong. If you’ve been following the news coming out of the US lately
you’ll know the most pressing issues facing the country – from the standpoint of
the Republican Party, which controls of House of Representatives – are transgender people, limiting the provision of women’s healthcare (including abortion),
and making sure white children aren’t made to feel bad by learning about the country’s brutal racist heritage.
It is possible that US politicians will come to their senses and start working on finding solutions to real problems facing the country – but I wouldn’t bet on it.