Article In The Atlantic: Legalizing Sports Gambling Was A Huge Mistake (1 Viewer)

[Terminalxylem]

The article says increased but then gives stats that gambling decreases domestic violence.

Can you quote those stats?

A third recent paper, from the University of Oregon economists Kyutaro Matsuzawa and Emily Arnesen, shows another, perhaps more surprising—and certainly more harrowing—harm of gambling legalization: domestic violence. Earlier research found that an NFL home team’s upset loss causes a 10 percent increase in reported incidents of men being violent toward their partner. Matsuzawa and Arnesen extend this, finding that in states where sports betting is legal, the effect is even bigger. They estimate that legal sports betting leads to a roughly 9 percent increase in intimate-partner violence.

Gambling represents a 9% increase. Your team being upset results in a 10% increase. Seems like if we transition people away from rooting for teams to gambling we’d see a 10% decrease in domestic violence.

I think they’re saying upset losses increase domestic violence 10%, and legalized gambling adds an additional 9% to the baseline.

ETA already been said

 

[Terminalxylem]

A third recent paper, from the University of Oregon economists Kyutaro Matsuzawa and Emily Arnesen, shows another, perhaps more surprising—and certainly more harrowing—harm of gambling legalization: domestic violence. Earlier research found that an NFL home team’s upset loss causes a 10 percent increase in reported incidents of men being violent toward their partner. Matsuzawa and Arnesen extend this, finding that in states where sports betting is legal, the effect is even bigger. They estimate that legal sports betting leads to a roughly 9 percent increase in intimate-partner violence.

Gambling represents a 9% increase. Your team being upset results in a 10% increase. Seems like if we transition people away from rooting for teams to gambling we’d see a 10% decrease in domestic violence.

I read that as legal gambling adds an additional 9% on top of the 10%.

Possibly, but it's extremely poorly written and an example of bad journalism by the Athletic.

That said, is it reasonable to assume that someone is polling domestic abusers and asking if your home team lost and if you're gambling legally? What kind of sample size are we talking about in this study? Furthermore, I would assume it wouldn't really be "legal gambling" and would be "losing at legal gambling". It doesn't make sense that someone would win a bet and say you know, that's a good reason to abuse my partner.

Here is the paper

Feel free to review their methodology.

NM @General Malaise beat me to it. Probably should read all posts before responding.

 

[Max Power]

Alarming patterns have started to emerge. Two recent working papers look at the economic impacts of legalization. One, by Northwestern University’s Scott Baker and colleagues, finds that legal sports gambling depletes households’ savings. Specifically, for every $1 spent on betting, households put $2 less into investment accounts. States see big increases in the risk of overdrafting a bank account or maxing out a credit card. These effects are strongest among already precarious households.

I feel like this statistic would be true for almost any variable. Every extra dollar spent on things outside of basic needs would reduce money put into investments.

The link of legalized gambling to decreased financial health also seems kind of loose. They reported a 0.3% reduction in credit score over several years in states with legalized gambling vs states without. It goes into additional financial struggles people are having and seemingly wants to apply those additional troubles to fallout from gambling. The reality could very well be that people are already struggling and tried to use on-line gambling as a way out of trouble and it didn't work.

Gambling addiction is real and that is a real problem.

 

[The Z Machine]

Eh, I think it's quite reasonable to think that an addiction that can suck up your wealth quickly would result in decreased financial health on average. Sure, some folks can handle the low scale transfer of their money to casinos. Maybe those funds would have been spent elsewhere on other entertainment or drugs or drink. But there might be enough folks that get in really deep and push the averages a little.

 

[Sammy3469]

FWIW, Patel (the ex-Jag's guy that got 6.5 years for embezzling 23 million from the Jags to gamble of DFS) filed a $250 million dollar lawsuit against FanDuel (looks like most of the funds ended up being lost there). Reading between the lines, it looks like FanDuel's employees/VIP host knew how to get around AML rules. It'll be interesting to see where this goes as they were pretty clearly violating their FINCen KYC obligations. Judging by what the VIP host did, he isn't the only employee who knows how to get around whatever controls they had in place.

FanDuel Sued by Convicted NFL Executive Over Gambling Habit (1)

FanDuel Inc. was sued by a former Jacksonville Jaguars executive who admitted to stealing more than $22 million from the team, but says the website knew he was an addicted gambler and offered him more than $1 million in credits and “lavish” gifts to make sure he continued to place bets.

news.bloomberglaw.com

 

[CletiusMaximus]

I didn't realize how far out of the information loop I am on this gambling trend. I haven't watched a pre-game or post-game NFL show for years because my weekends are typically so crazy. Today I'm home alone and just turned on the football 10 minutes early and caught the last few minutes of the Fox pregame show. I had no idea that Bradshaw, Strahan and the boys are just openly shilling for daily fantasy gambling now. They gave their recommended bets as they were signing off and none of them were spreads, totals or moneylines - all recommended bets were fantasy adjacent daily performance props - for me the most addictive, worst ev form of gambling out there. Its no different than if Howie were up there recommending that teenagers all go buy some scratch-offs or bet snake eyes on their phone craps app and extolling the great odds it pays. And to think the NFL has actually suspended players for gambling, taken away their ability to make a living. The open hypocrisy is one of those incredible funny/sad phenomena for me.

 

[Max Power]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

 

[Max Power]

Also added that parlays are bets for suckers and are the largest winners for the sports books.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

I listened to Saagar from Break Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting points.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of user ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

I 100% believe the bolded parts. The thing about only 5% of people withdrawing winnings is pretty much exactly in line with online poker, back when that was a big thing (it's probably still accurate, but I don't know). And gambling is definitely a whale-driven economy. Think about about those guys who drop six figures on stupid phone games. It's because of those people that phone games are designed to direct you to the store, and why Madden has so many microtransactions. They're the reason why they haven't made a new GTA in ten years. Once you understand that whales exist, it explains a lot about certain products.

 

[CletiusMaximus]

Also added that parlays are bets for suckers and are the largest winners for the sports books.

The marketing on daily performance parlays is genius and plays directly to the weaknesses of low-information betters. I suck at math but my understanding is its not hard, with basic knowledge of how to calculate probabilities and understanding of odds, to do the math on whether a parlay payout is accurate (spoiler, they almost never are.) They are certainly sucker bets in most all instances in the modern betting world.

There was a time a decade or so ago when the gambling thread here (and I'm sure everywhere else) was having a blast using an NFL betting strategy known as Wong Teasers, which is a form of a parlay as it involved betting on the outcome of two games. The Wong teaser bets appealed to me because no analysis was needed - you just had to recognize the conditions that gave rise to the bets and bet every two-game combination that fit the system every week. Some weeks there were none, other times there were a dozen or more. It was a purely quant analysis so we didn't care about injuries, weather, records, etc. One poster here posted his bets every gameday and was able to remodel his basement after a few great weeks during the NFL preseason. The bookmakers eventually changed the payouts, rendering the system no longer profitable. That's when I closed all my online gambling accounts and haven't placed a bet since.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Also added that parlays are bets for suckers and are the largest winners for the sports books.

The marketing on daily performance parlays is genius and plays directly to the weaknesses of low-information betters. I suck at math but my understanding is its not hard, with basic knowledge of how to calculate probabilities and understanding of odds, to do the math on whether a parlay payout is accurate (spoiler, they almost never are.) They are certainly sucker bets in most all instances in the modern betting world.

There was a time a decade or so ago when the gambling thread here (and I'm sure everywhere else) was having a blast using an NFL betting strategy known as Wong Teasers, which is a form of a parlay as it involved betting on the outcome of two games. The Wong teaser bets appealed to me because no analysis was needed - you just had to recognize the conditions that gave rise to the bets and bet every two-game combination that fit the system every week. Some weeks there were none, other times there were a dozen or more. It was a purely quant analysis so we didn't care about injuries, weather, records, etc. One poster here posted his bets every gameday and was able to remodel his basement after a few great weeks during the NFL preseason. The bookmakers eventually changed the payouts, rendering the system no longer profitable. That's when I closed all my online gambling accounts and haven't placed a bet since.

Different corner of the gambling world, but my experience with online poker was similar. I made what looks like a stupid amount of money* by simply out-folding people for the most part. Sure, I knew how to play my hand post-flop, but the real money came from finding people who play way too many hands, out-folding them, and then following them around, preferably at 6-max tables so you can play more hands against them faster. After they cut off the American banks, the games I played in very quickly turned into the same twenty or so guys playing 6-8 tables at a time against each other, with the occasional European fish thrown in. It turns out that break-even poker is nowhere near as a fun as 4bb/hr poker.

* But was really just "minimum wage times a decent number of hours played over several years."

 

[Joe Bryant]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

Thanks. I recognize the Saagar guy on the video and know he's popular. But what is the vibe and reputation? I want to be clear as I share this.

 

[General Malaise]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

Unfortunately, I haven't run into this issue with DK but.....this happened to me (and many other FBGs) on off-shore websites due to winning too many prop bets (in my case) and it's just a dirty tactic. They have no problem taking your money when you lose, but if you win too often? They cut you. I just assumed that was the dirty-work of off-shore books during the period of online gambling illegality but no....no, publicly traded companies that cater to legal sports betting in the US are doing this too. Shame!

 

[CletiusMaximus]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

Thanks. I recognize the Saagar guy on the video and know he's popular. But what is the vibe and reputation? I want to be clear as I share this.

Saagar is the conservative foil to the liberal Krystall Ball on the popular Breaking Points podcast (which used to be called "Rising.") He also has his own separate podcast called The Realignment. I subscribe to both on Spotify and would say they are both very good but I rarely have the ability to listen to them any more. I'm not certain about his reputation but my impression is he's a very smart and fair guy, albeit a bit young. His vibe is just that imo - a smart guy who is extremely articulate and talks the talk to appeal to younger people. He talks mostly politics but frequently gets into social issues, finance, economics, law, etc.

 

[thecatch]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

I'm not inherently a pro-regulation guy, but this cries out for some at least minimal industry rulemaking.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

I'm not inherently a pro-regulation guy, but this cries out for some at least minimal industry rulemaking.

I would think carefully before regulating this practice. We ran a natural experiment on this topic in the blackjack world. For decades, Las Vegas casinos were allowed to ban card counters and New Jersey casinos weren't. The result was that blackjack games in New Jersey had a much higher house advantage than Vegas. (I know that the Vegas games all suck now too, but that wasn't the case twenty years ago).

 

[Joe Bryant]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

Thanks. I recognize the Saagar guy on the video and know he's popular. But what is the vibe and reputation? I want to be clear as I share this.

Saagar is the conservative foil to the liberal Krystall Ball on the popular Breaking Points podcast (which used to be called "Rising.") He also has his own separate podcast called The Realignment. I subscribe to both on Spotify and would say they are both very good but I rarely have the ability to listen to them any more. I'm not certain about his reputation but my impression is he's a very smart and fair guy, albeit a bit young. His vibe is just that imo - a smart guy who is extremely articulate and talks the talk to appeal to younger people. He talks mostly politics but frequently gets into social issues, finance, economics, law, etc.

Thanks @CletiusMaximus. That's what I was looking for.

 

[Max Power]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

Thanks. I recognize the Saagar guy on the video and know he's popular. But what is the vibe and reputation? I want to be clear as I share this.

Saagar is the conservative foil to the liberal Krystall Ball on the popular Breaking Points podcast (which used to be called "Rising.") He also has his own separate podcast called The Realignment. I subscribe to both on Spotify and would say they are both very good but I rarely have the ability to listen to them any more. I'm not certain about his reputation but my impression is he's a very smart and fair guy, albeit a bit young. His vibe is just that imo - a smart guy who is extremely articulate and talks the talk to appeal to younger people. He talks mostly politics but frequently gets into social issues, finance, economics, law, etc.

Yep. I started listening to him when he was on Rising with The Hill. I don't know all of his positions on things, but Rising and Breaking Points have a great format for people who want to listen to intelligence conversations on political topics. There isn't any yelling and its two people who can articulate their positions while listening to the other.

IMO Saagar is about as mild of a political commentator as you'll find.

Edit: However, I do think the title he used was a bit sensational.

 

[thecatch]

I listened to Saagar from Breaking Points do a piece on sports gambling and he had a couple interesting takes.

- Sports Books are up almost half a trillion dollars since legalization.
- Only 5% of users ever withdrawal winnings
- If you win too often, they will end your user agreement
- The bottom 3% of losers account for 50% of sports book profits (Hard to believe this number, but its probably true)
- Dramatic increase in gambling anonymous phone calls. Mostly young men, some under the legal betting age.
-He also sourced all the things the OP article did.

Why Online Gambling Is The Next Opioid Crisis​

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

His final recommendation was to restrict sports betting along the same lines of other vices. Take it off line and make betting in person. Limit advertising on networks.

I'm not inherently a pro-regulation guy, but this cries out for some at least minimal industry rulemaking.

I would think carefully before regulating this practice. We ran a natural experiment on this topic in the blackjack world. For decades, Las Vegas casinos were allowed to ban card counters and New Jersey casinos weren't. The result was that blackjack games in New Jersey had a much higher house advantage than Vegas. (I know that the Vegas games all suck now too, but that wasn't the case twenty years ago).

That's interesting. I would not even necessarily be against more of a house advantage for online betting sites though, as long as the factors that created that advantage were clearly and openly disclosed. That might even be net positive for society if the disclosures caused people to stay out of the market entirely.

 

[Johnny Rock]

Most of you probably know but The Atlantic is highly respected. This isn't some random blog.

The Atlantic is consistently at the top of thoughtful high quality journalism with a broad appeal and lots of respect.

I came across this post and couldn’t help but respond despite you being the Owner of FBG.

Please look further into what the Atlantic is, does, and who funds it. They are literally the most famous Democrat propaganda. It exists only for that reason.

 

[Joe Bryant]

Most of you probably know but The Atlantic is highly respected. This isn't some random blog.

The Atlantic is consistently at the top of thoughtful high quality journalism with a broad appeal and lots of respect.

I came across this post and couldn’t help but respond despite you being the Owner of FBG.

Please look further into what the Atlantic is, does, and who funds it. They are literally the most famous Democrat propaganda. It exists only for that reason.

Thanks. Yes, there is a lot of left leaning content on the Atlantic. I think this chart is pretty accurate. https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-chart

But we don't do the political talk here any longer so please let's leave it at that. I think this feature was unbiased and talked through much of the relevant discussions on gambling. Let's please keep it to that.