Sports Gambling Is Still a Bad Bet

Welcome to Breakpoint, a daily look at an ever-changing culture through the lens of unchanging truth. For the Golson Center, I'm John Stone Street. A recently released port shows a clear correlation between legalized gambling and gambling addiction.

Now this should of course surprise absolutely no one, but it is further evidence that the explosion of legalized sports gambling was a bad idea. In 2018, a Supreme Court decision cleared the way for states to legalize sports betting. And ever since, according to the study shared by Epic Research, gambling disorders have risen by 61% in states that allow it. But it is down 29% in states that have not. That's what they call a big spread, pun intended.

And the timeframe here is significant. Only Nevada allowed sports gambling prior to 2018. Today it's legal in 39 states and in DC, though app-based gambling has made it basically ubiquitous. The results of this experience speak for themselves. Quoting from the study of the overall population, adults age 30 to 49 had the highest overall quarterly rate of diagnosed gambling disorder through the study period.

The largest proportional increase was among adults age 18 to 29 whose rate more than doubled. Rates rose in both sexes and in every age group, but the male-to-female gap was substantially larger in adults under 50. Look, the math of sports gambling speaks for itself. For example, sports betting companies make enough to pay out a fortune in constant commercials with big celebrities while still raking in incredible profits. As of last year, gambling businesses have taken in around $300 billion.

That's as much as China spends on its military every year. And the cost to consumers is not just in the bet. According to a 2025 article by Charles Fain Lehman in The Atlantic, for every dollar that's spent on betting, household investing falls by an average of $2. The years since 2018 have been marked by large increases in overdrafted bank accounts and maxed out credit cards. Legalized sports gambling has increased the risk that a household goes bankrupt by 25 to 30 percent, and it's caused debt delinquency to surge.

And the financial strain, in turn, worsens social pathologies. According to research also cited by Lehman, an upset loss for an NFL home team correlates to a 10% spike in male domestic abuse. Overall, states with legalized sports gambling have seen an estimated 9% increase in intimate partner violence. As it turns out, it seems, it is possible to legislate morality, in this case to legislate and increase an immorality. The legalization of sports gambling and the general betting industrial complex is a scourge on society as if a highly contagious illness had a multi-billion dollar PR campaign driving it.

This is a cause that both the left and the right can get behind. Progressives couldn't find a better example of the rich getting richer on the backs of the poor, and conservatives have a horribly perfect example here of the effects of moral decay and the corruption of domestic life. Look, moral decline is not inevitable. Too many are convinced that things always will go from bad to worse, so why even try to turn the tide? Fighting the new normal, especially one like this with so much money and political power behind it, is an uphill battle.

But Christians are commanded to love our neighbors, not based on condition.

Sometimes that'll mean giving to a local charity.

Sometimes that means pressing our leaders to ban that which is destroying lives. For the Colson Center, I'm John Stone Street with Breakpoint. Today's Breakpoint was co-authored with Dr. Timothy Padgett. If you're a fan of Breakpoint, leave us a review wherever you download your podcast and find more resources or share this commentary with others by visiting Breakpoint.org.