Stop Predatory Gambling

Will Indiana lead the way to stop predatory gambling?

by spgadmin

Indiana is about to experience the reality of a something for nothing scheme which is more commonly described as “casino capitalism.”

As surrounding states like Michigan, Ohio and Illinois all consider adding more extreme forms of predatory gambling into their communities, Indiana’s own revenues from predatory gambling are being seriously threatened. Here is one of the story’s important quotes:

“In some respects we are playing defense, much more than we ever have,” said Mike Smith, president of the Casino Association of Indiana. “The state could wake up one day and find out that $300 million of their revenue is gone. It’s time to take a look at how we built this industry and make sure the tools are there to allow us to compete.”

How did they build the casino “industry” in Indiana? On a business model that relies on 90% of the revenue coming from 10% of the people who use the product – out-of-control and heavily indebted people.

They built it pushing a product, according to a prominent MIT professor, that is designed to get people “to play to extinction” – until all of their money is gone- and considers “every player a potential addict.”

They built it using predatory marketing practices like relentlessly targeting people who use casino ATMs – people who lost all the money they came with and then chase their losses – and highly sophisticated consumer loyalty technology that tracks how fast people play a slot machine and how much money they wager and lose each time.

They built it by rendering some of the state’s citizens expendable, violating America’s core democratic principle of equal citizenship.

Indiana was a leader in the expansion of predatory gambling. The time has come for Indiana to lead the way to stop predatory gambling.