How to make a Chicago casino a social asset — not a public pariah

When it comes to a casino in Chicago, the question used to be “If?” Would it ever be built?

Now the question is “Where?”

But all along, the more important question has been “What?”

Don’t we all know what a casino is, either from first-hand experience or from movies and TV?

Actually, no. There are significant differences in how casinos operate. And the most important differences — the ones that determine whether a casino is a social asset or public pariah — are the measures put in place to protect casino customers.

OPINION

A small percentage of adults are compulsive gamblers who ruin their lives through their bad relationships with betting. They build up large debts, neglect their jobs and families, and sometimes turn to crime to finance their obsession. For casinos, such problem gamblers are lucrative customers. Without regulations and enforcement, a profit-oriented casino does not have much incentive to rein in or drive away its best customers, no matter how much they suffer from their gambling addiction.

Self-exclusion programs, where people voluntarily agree to be barred from casinos, offer some help to people struggling to control their gambling. Illinois mandates that self-exclusion enrollment be available on casino premises. But availability and accessibility are not the same thing. You can spend lots of time in an Illinois casino without ever learning about self-exclusion.

Casinos could be different. The self-exclusion option could be plastered on walls, in restrooms, at restaurants, and via pop-up notices on slot machines.

Compulsive gamblers are not the only people who make bad gambling-related choices. Some standard practices in casinos — no clocks, no direct sunlight — seem to be aimed at ensuring that customers are ignorant or misled. The average amount of wagers returned as winnings by individual slot machines is not revealed, even though this type of price information is available. Indeed, it is of central interest to the casino. How many other sellers hide their prices?

Regulations can help induce better gambling decisions. Slot machines could display constantly updated information about how long someone has been gambling, and their net monetary position — people have a persistent tendency to underestimate their gambling losses. Slots could require a five-minute break each hour. ATMs could be forbidden on casino premises or made rather inaccessible. Gamblers could select pre-play “loss limits,” the most they will allow themselves to lose, with the casino ending their session once those limits are reached.

These are the sorts of regulations that should be discussed before Chicago’s casino becomes a reality.

Further, the rules for the casino should require that they make themselves available for policy experiments, to help identify those regulations that can aid problem or misguided gamblers, with minimal intrusions on those whose gambling behavior is well-informed.

No matter where the Chicago casino is located, “what” we want is a business that doesn’t take advantage of the sick, the addicted or the confused.

Jim Leitzel teaches public policy and economics at the University of Chicago. He is the author of Regulating Vice, Cambridge University Press, 2008.