Photo: Ted Hsu/Alamy Stock Photo
Right out of the gate, in its first two months of legalized sports betting, New York blew past Las Vegas and Atlantic City to become the No. 1 place in America for gamblers to throw away their hard-earned money. New Yorkers have wagered more than $2 billion since the beginning of the year, with $80 million going to the state treasury. New York television and computer screens have been swamped by cheesy ads urging us to bet all day and night, in public casinos and on private cell phones.
The seldom-mentioned casualties of this brave new world are the New Yorkers afflicted with gambling disorder, a condition that has been recognized by the medical profession in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders since 1980.
As day follows night, the current explosion in betting will be followed by a less-heralded wave of debt, bankruptcy, divorce, and suicide. That’s not just an unfortunate side effect; bleeding problem gamblers dry is the business model. And New York has now blessed this unhappy arrangement and is a full partner in the fleecing, taking a major cut of gambling proceeds.
New York is one of 30 states that now allow betting on sports, in person or online. Nationwide, Americans bet about $7.6 billion on the Super Bowl, and will gamble billions more on March…
