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The rising human cost of sports betting

nytimes.com

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Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#271

Post by UncleMeat »

Raidion wrote: post #80
animal_spirits wrote: post #8

Promotion of gambling should be likened to promotion of cigarettes. It should be illegal to advertise gambling, but I don't think it should be outlawed to gamble. People should be able to choose how they live their lives, but we should do all that we can to prevent mass manipulation through adverts in industries that are known to be harmful. I also think that alcohol and e-cig advertising should be outlawed as well.

I honestly agree with you, but am worried about the precedent it would set. If you start banning stuff because of addiction, does it apply to things like soda or fast food? Would it apply to things like baseball cards or other collectables? This is a really tricky problem, as there is clear evidence that these things hurt society as a whole, but it's hard to draw the line who is making deliberate choices about their…

I actually think it should be illegal to advertise soda.

Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#272

Post by HWR_14 »

vkou wrote: post #200
bregma wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

State lotteries are just a tax on the stupid.

If you're poor as dirt, but have five bucks to spare, from a mathematical perspective, you'd be stupid to not put it down on ten-thousand-to-one odds to win 20 grand. Five dollars won't make any difference in your situation, but twenty thousand would be a life-changing amount of money. Unfortunately, on a meta level, it's likely that were you to win, you'd go from twenty thousand to zero sooner than you'd like.

Yeah, you might go from 20k to 0, but you might be out of debt and end up with a reliable car you'll keep for a decade.

Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#273

Post by HWR_14 »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #154
babypuncher wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

State lotteries are a means to shift tax burden from the wealthy to the poor. Every time one is implemented to "support education", it is always followed by a tax break for the upper class, resulting in a net 0 increase in school budgets.

>Every time one is implemented to "support education", it is always followed by a tax break for the upper class, resulting in a net 0 increase in school budgets. My gut tells me tax breaks are the exception and more often than not increased revenues are simply paired with boondoggle spending because money is fungible.

Your gut is wrong. Lottery revenues track with tax breaks in most states.

Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#274

Post by drsnow »

optimalsolver wrote: post #75
323 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, we just legalize gambling, just like we should legalize drug use. People should be free to use drugs, drink alchool, or gamble.

Right. As long as we also we have hard measures to deal with those whose personal choices begin impacting their fellow citizens.

Would you provide an example?

Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#275

Post by from »

slap_shot wrote: post #46

I'm pretty Laissez-Faire about things, but a recent interaction with gambling is making me reconsider: My friend got a lot of free credits from the major sports books and wrote some code that he felt could generate a profit. We all threw in a little bit of money and let the program do what it does. Within a month we started doing 1k a day in profit on 3k wagered. Right as we approached 30k in profit, every major book…

Not available to Americans (at least the ones unwilling to use BTC and a VPN), but Pinnacle (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinnacle_Sports) is happy to take sharp bettors. If you're just arbing major US books then yeah you will get banned quickly.

Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#276

Post by chrisco255 »

estaseuropano wrote: post #205

I travel a lot on Europe (at least pre covid) and one of the worst social trends has been the spread of betting agencies, especially the aptly named Ladbrokes but a number of others too. They shoele up mostly in the poorer parts of big cities and suck the money out of poor people hoping for a break. I saw them largely first in England, then Ireland, Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and noe pretty much everywhere. They e…

Are you kidding wrt lottery? People will spend their whole paycheck on scratch offs. What culture do they fund? There is no tangible difference between a casino and a lottery except that you tend to get better odds in a casino.

Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#278

Post by JumpCrisscross »

babypuncher wrote: post #73
vgeek wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.theringer.com/2019/6/5/18644504/sports-betting-b... This is a long read, but is really insightful on how the industry really works. If you're a consistently winning bettor, you're going to get blocked pretty quickly when you're betting against the house. Why would a casino want to play a game where they don't have odds in their favor when they can just ban the sharps and feast on the casuals? With parimut…

I think that should be illegal. If we are going to allow casinos to operate at all, then we shouldn't allow them to discriminate against potential customers on the basis that said customers are better at the game. If that means their business model is no longer viable, then that is their problem.

> If we are going to allow casinos to operate at all, then we shouldn't allow them to discriminate against potential customers on the basis that said customers are better at the game

Casinos aren't common carriers. The rules should be fair, disclosed in advance and not ad hoc. But why one would force a casino to e.g. take the other side of a billionaire's bet is beyond me.

Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#279

Post by dillondoyle »

bregma wrote: post #117
babypuncher wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

State lotteries are a means to shift tax burden from the wealthy to the poor. Every time one is implemented to "support education", it is always followed by a tax break for the upper class, resulting in a net 0 increase in school budgets.

State lotteries are just a tax on the stupid.

I buy power ball or mega millions tickets somewhat often. Like one at a time. The 10 minutes thinking about it after I buy it before I get to my office is plenty worth the $2.

The brain still has fun even knowing not going to win and just spent $2.

Re: The rising human cost of sports betting

#280

Post by anonu »

babypuncher wrote: post #73
vgeek wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.theringer.com/2019/6/5/18644504/sports-betting-b... This is a long read, but is really insightful on how the industry really works. If you're a consistently winning bettor, you're going to get blocked pretty quickly when you're betting against the house. Why would a casino want to play a game where they don't have odds in their favor when they can just ban the sharps and feast on the casuals? With parimut…

I think that should be illegal. If we are going to allow casinos to operate at all, then we shouldn't allow them to discriminate against potential customers on the basis that said customers are better at the game. If that means their business model is no longer viable, then that is their problem.

Why would a legislator make that illegal if their constituents benefit from the taxes it raises? Making it illegal would represent an errosion of their revenues...
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