Today's Casino Is Handheld: Will The Law Protect Children From Gambling?

Today's games aren't one and done deals. Be it for one of the big consoles, a PC, or your phone, the model has moved toward incentivizing gamers to shell out more money to access more features. Who makes for better prospective customers than people that have already bought from you, right?

This would be simple enough, but another business trend is on the rise: gamification. It's a way of encouraging consumers to interact with a product that scratches the satisfactory endorphiny part of our brains rather than the "Oh shit I just spend my child's college fund" part that's probably closer to the forehead. Look I'm not an expert on cranial cartography. But I do know that the rise in legalized gambling is driving a need to make sure that kids don't end up playing games that can cost them and their families a lot more than initially bargained for. From VOA News:

The rapid expansion of legalized sports betting in 33 states, with three more states coming soon, has brought steps designed to keep children from gambling, including age confirmation and identity checks. But teens can bypass betting restrictions and place wagers on their phones by using a parent or other relative's account, or via unregulated offshore betting sites that can be less vigilant about age checks. And some teens have weekend poker games where hundreds of dollars are won or lost, often fueled by money from parents.

According to the National Council on Problem Gambling, 60% to 80% of high school students report having gambled for money during the past year; 4% to 6% of these students are considered at risk of developing a gambling problem.

Now, a few states are moving toward gambling education in public schools. The effort is in its infancy, and the details of what would be taught are still to be determined.

I think that the more insidious danger are those games that --while not marketing themselves as gambling avenues -- function in similar ways. For example, remember Pokemon Go? You probably played it; its takeover in 2016 is likely the closest we'll ever come to world peace in this generation. There's no question that the game has been a cash cow for Niantic; the company grossed $703M in 2022 from its in-game purchases. And while the age of the average Pokemon Go-er is overwhelmingly above 18, there's a lot of room on the remaining bell curve for kids to be the ones spending (their parent's?) hard won cash on the games more random number generator (RNG) based elements. Or, if Pokemon GO isn't your kid's vice, maybe it's Roblox?

Ten-year-old spent GBP2,500 of mum's money on Roblox without her knowing https://t.co/HVOJU6GEeb

-- BBC News (UK) (@BBCNews) May 22, 2023

The fact that this happened across the pond doesn't really mitigate the risk posed by children gaming near their parent's credit cards. Epic Games recently footed a $520M bill for, among other things, deceptively targeting children. Is gambling the new smoking for kids? If states don't crack down on companies marketing their services to children, it may very well be. Without some sort of intervention, we're gonna be living in a Family Guy bit.

As Legal Gambling Surges, Some US States Want to Teach Teens About Risks [VOANews]

Chris Williams became a social media manager and assistant editor for Above the Law in June 2021. Prior to joining the staff, he moonlighted as a minor Memelord(TM) in the Facebook group Law School Memes for Edgy T14s. He endured Missouri long enough to graduate from Washington University in St. Louis School of Law. He is a former boatbuilder who cannot swim, a published author on critical race theory, philosophy, and humor, and has a love for cycling that occasionally annoys his peers. You can reach him by email at cwilliams@abovethelaw.com and by tweet at @WritesForRent.