Among households with known sports betting, nearly one-third (31%) cut spending on essentials at least once to place bets or cover losses — in North Carolina, that share was slightly higher, at 37%. And one-third (33%) of North Carolina parents in households with known sports betting say they are somewhat or very concerned about the financial risks betting poses for their family.
Here’s why this matters: Family economic security, well-being, and household predictability are important drivers of healthy child development. Financial instability harms children regardless of a family’s overall income level — even households that don’t fall into the lower ends of the income spectrum, that experience a discrete, unpredictable income shock, such as an involuntary job loss, see measurable effects on kids’ academic outcomes, driven by parental stress and disrupted family routines. Sports betting losses that force a household to cut spending on essentials contribute to that same kind of volatility in family life, even when the household isn’t poor by any standard measure.
Allowing increased legal access to various types of gambling– especially online– has been a huge cultural and political mistake. We need to figure out a way to reverse it.
Any kind of gambling is bad… wrong . Period !
We have a lot more legal gambling in NC than we had a few decades ago, Fred. It is hard to make the case that this is an improvement.