Gambling is addictive for some, in the same way that alcohol is addictive for some, yet blanket alcohol prohibition is not considered a great idea in hindsight.
Gambling is addictive for some, in the same way that alcohol is addictive for some, yet blanket alcohol prohibition is not considered a great idea in hindsight.
I don't know how we could put limits on gambling that would make sense, though. There's a huge difference in bets that I used to make (which were all black-market sports bets, usually on 'game winner' or over/under) ~ once a week during the NFL season vs. the shit going on with FanDuel and all these phone-based gamified services. And that stuff absolutely encourages you to make bets that you can't afford and can easily turn into a problem even for someone who isn't 'addicted' per se -- it's like the predatory loot box model from video games.
TLDR I don't know how you write a law that would put hard and fast limits on what can be bet on and how much an individual is allowed to bet during a week in a way that would be palatable to the companies. I'm in favor of the blanket ban at this point; the black market for betting has always existed and it was better than the current setup.
I think banning or severely limiting advertising similar to cigarettes would be a good start. Stop having sports broadcasts be so intertwined with gambling, seeing odds on the screen when watching sports is gross.
You could make it so that if someone called the gambling hotline then they automatically are suspended from betting at all sports books for a year or something. Idk if this is the perfect policy but it took me about 5 minutes to come up with it.