Thread

1. whatever1 · 1789584798 · focus · HN ↗

   All gambling should be state owned. It is a strict societal loss anyway, we can at least soften the overall blow.

   Losses can be redistributed and cover for the externalities of gambling. And we will be able to control the knob on how addictive we make them.

   For profit companies have the target to maximize their profit, so of course they will ramp up any method that can bring in more revenue.

   1. pfisch · 1789587508 · focus · HN ↗

      It should either be illegal or not. This idea that the state has a monopoly on getting money from doing a thing that you are saying is bad doesn't make sense.

      If it is bad and yet the government is allowed to use it to make money then is the government evil? Why does the government get to do it if we can't? It just makes the whole thing seem ridiculous and makes underground betting seem like I guess it isn't really that bad since the government is allowed to do it. The operators are just people fighting for their freedom to operate the same business the government operates.

      1. well_ackshually · 1789588504 · focus · HN ↗

         Some things are better left in control of the government _because_ they are dangerous. You either:

         * Outlaw gambling, and gamblers will just go towards shadier options, putting their own lives in even more risk.

         * Allow private operators whose goal is to extract as much money from possible from gamblers as possible and ensure that you will inevitably have people abusing the system up to the limits to which it can go and testing out if they can go further, over and over again

         * Government ran gambling organisations that can ensure they also offer proper systems to wean yourself off, offer healthcare, and make use of the money "made" from operating it to improve your health care systems.

         Only one of those options is sensible.

         >The operators are just people fighting for their freedom to operate the same business the government operates.

         HAHAHAHAHA. No. Absolutely not. Some people are truly as caricatural as movies and books make them appear, and casino owners truly live up to it. I worked for them, for "betting rooms", anything you want: they are thieves, mafias, manipulators and bring nothing but misery on the world. They're not "fighting for their freedom", they have found a legal way to abuse human misery and addictions.

         1. SoftTalker · 1789591409 · focus · HN ↗

            > Government ran gambling organisations that can ensure they also offer proper systems to wean yourself off, offer healthcare, and make use of the money "made" from operating it to improve your health care systems.

            Please list any state lotteries that offer any of these things. All I've seen is an 800 number to call, listed in the fine print at the bottom of the advertising. And they advertise everywhere, and though many were established with promises to "fund education" or something that sounds noble, money is fungible so it just gets sloshed around in the state budgets.

            1. well_ackshually · 1789592296 · focus · HN ↗

               "My country that is hostile to public healthcare doesn't offer public healthcare" no shit sherlock, the US's healthcare system is a shitshow. Look at anywhere in Europe where those lotteries are publicly ran. The entire post is about changing the law, that doesn't include closing your eyes on how it's currently shit.

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