Roll the Dice: A Contradiction on Gambling

People don't seem to know what they want when it comes to gambling. According to two separate polls from Rasmussen, people loathe gambling if it is online, but love it if it is on terra firma. One poll published on August 10th asked people if they had ever gambled online and what they thought of online gambling in general, while another poll conducted on August 9 asked respondents if they approved or disapproved of gambling locally. The results are pretty surprising if you put the responses from both together. It seems that gambling is no longer a moral issue in America..

The August 10th poll found that only 4 percent said (admitted would be a better word) they had gambled online, while 94 percent say they have never gambled online. Interestingly, 66 percent of those same respondents said they had in fact gambled at a real casino. On the legality of online gambling, 44 percent said Internet gambling should be outlawed altogether, while 41 percent believe it should be legal and 15 percent were not sure. Finally, 61 percent of those surveyed said that if Internet gambling was approved by the federal government, it would make them less likely to gamble online, while 13 percent said it would make them more likely to use online gambling web sites. Around 24 percent said it would have no impact on their Internet gambling practices, whatever that means.

The August 9th poll throws state-run lotteries into the mix, but also talks about state-run casinos. The poll found that 50 percent favor allowing casino gambling in their own state, while 37 percent oppose it. To break it down a little more, 59 percent of those that said they have gambled in a casino seemed to favor such gambling, while 29 percent of the same group oppose casino gambling in their state.

If anything the polls show that Americans no longer oppose gambling for the moral reasons that used to be prevalent in the discussion. Since many states are looking for new revenue streams to pay for their over-spending, these polls prove to be pretty interesting.