Is It Time to Ban Sports Gambling Again?

Back in 2018, the Supreme Court allowed states to legalize sports gambling. “Six years into the experiment, the evidence is convincing: Legalizing sports gambling was a huge mistake,” writes Charles Fain Lehman in the Atlantic. It may be harmless fun for a lot of people, but far too many can’t control the impulse, and the ubiquitous ads on TV and online aren’t helping. In his essay, Lehman cites studies suggesting that the proliferation of gambling is taking a heavy toll, and usually on families that can least afford it. “Specifically, for every $1 spent on betting, households put $2 less into investment accounts,” he writes, adding that households with gamblers are more likely to see credit cards maxed out, checking accounts overdrawn, and even bankruptcy.

“More harrowing” is a University of Oregon study estimating that intimate-partner violence rises 9% in states where gambling is legal, he writes. At this point, 38 states allow gambling, with little to show for it given that tax revenue “has been anemic”—less than alcohol, tobacco, or marijuana, writes Lehman. And that’s even as Goldman Sachs says Americans now bet $1 billion a month, up 20-fold since it was legalized. It’s time to ban gambling anew, argues Lehman. “If the states are ‘laboratories of democracy,’ then the results of their experiment with sports gambling are in, and they are uniformly negative,” he writes. “Better to end the study now than prolong the suffering.” (Read his full essay, which includes more details on the studies cited.)