A Case Against Legalized Gambling
Reprinted from National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling
|
|
- Gambling costs far more than it benefits. Studies show that for every
dollar gambling produces for a regional economy, three dollars are lost
because of the economic and social costs of gambling. When government
legalizes more gambling, taxpayers lose - whether they gamble or not.
- Gambling cannibalizes local businesses. A hundred dollars spent in a slot
machine is a hundred dollars that is not spent in a local restaurant, theater
or retail store. As Donald Trump told the Miami Herald, "People will spend a
tremendous amount of money in casinos, money that they would normally spend
on buying a refrigerator or a new car. Local businesses will suffer because
they'll lose customer dollars to the casinos."
- Gambling triggers addiction. The more legalized gambling available, the
more addictive behavior is triggered. In 1989, only 1.7% of Iowa's adults
were gambling addicts, but after riverboat casinos were legalized, the rate
of addiction more than tripled to 5.4%. The Florida Office of Planning and
Budgeting conducted a study which concluded that the costs to government of
gambling addiction far outweighed all revenues that might be generated by
casino gambling.
- Gambling addiction has become an epidemic among youth. Researchers now
call gambling the fastest-growing teenage addiction, with the rate of
pathological gambling among high school and college-age youth about twice
that of adults. According to Dr. Howard Shaffer, Director of the Harvard
Medical School Center for Addiction Studies, "Today, there are more children
experiencing adverse symptoms from gambling than from drugs...and the problem
is growing."
- Gambling attracts crime. A comprehensive report by the Attorney General of
Maryland concludes, "Casinos would bring a substantial increase in crime to
our state. There would be more violent crime, more crimes against property,
more insurance fraud, more white collar crime, more juvenile crime, more drug
and alcohol-related crime, more domestic violence and child abuse, and more
organized crime."
- Gambling victimizes the poor. The poorest citizens spend the largest
percentage of their incomes on gambling. Those who can afford it the least
gamble the most. Both public and private gambling businesses target
advertising directly at the weakest individuals in society because they are
gambling's best customers.
- Gambling presents a bad example to our children. Gambling promotes the
idea that luck, not education and hard work, is the key to success. Gambling
produces no wealth for society, and suggests that productivity is not
important. Gambling sets up artificial risks and glorifies individuals who
take the biggest, most foolish risks.
- Gambling corrupts government. So much money is at stake, and gambling
companies are so dependent on governmental decisions for a piece of those
profits, that corruption is inevitable. Wherever gambling has gone, bribery,
extortion and payoffs have followed.
|
|
|
