Looking behind the poker face
The way through college is paved by cheap dates, empty cupboards, low-income housing and dumpster diving to save a few bucks.
But some students claim they can make it big by gambling the money they have in hopes to leave with more.
According to the Massachusetts Council on Compulsive Gambling, teenagers have a problem gambling rate two to three times higher than the general public.
Alex Sielatycki, a junior majoring in economics and finance, said college students may gamble money more often, but as long as it is kept under control, it is a form of recreation.
“It’s everywhere, even everyday purchases like insurance are a gamble,” Sielatycki said. “When you buy earthquake insurance, you are betting there will be an earthquake, while the insurance company is betting there won’t be. When you lose at the end of the year, you bet again when you renew your insurance.
“Gambling [is a problem] when you are betting away your kids’ clothing or food money, but if you’re playing poker for a $5 buy-in, it’s no big deal,” he said.
It may seem small compared to big problems on campus, such as binge drinking and unprotected sex, but gambling, especially innocent card games or online betting, may be penetrating deep into the pockets of college students and causing a whirlwind of domino effects.
“You may spend $5 going to a movie or spend $5 playing cards, the only difference is in cards you have the option of earning it back, as long as you keep it under control,” Sielatycki said.
He said when he plays poker most of the time, it is a simply $5 buy-in and the game is kept under control, but unfortunately, that is not always the case.
In one extreme example that drew national attention, in June 2003, a student at the University of Wisconsin murdered his three roommates because he owed them thousands of dollars in gambling bets. At the time of the murders, he had already lost $15,000 and had withdrawn $72,000 from his bank account to support his habits.
Texas Hold ‘Em, for some college students, is a part of everyday nightlife.
For Ed Looney, the director of the New Jersey Council on Compulsive Gambling, he saw this as a real problem. “I’ve never seen anything like this Texas Hold “Em rage. When crack cocaine came out, the phenomenon was similar.”
With tuition increasing, available grant money decreasing and the average student debt lingering around $10,000 and minimum wage not really paying the way through college, gambling is often seen as a way out of debt or into a little extra money.
Sielatycki said although he’s never been really serious into the gambling scene, he said his friends “get pretty serious” when they play poker.
Athough it is hard to get substantial statistics, it is clear the number of college gamblers is growing rapidly and in 2003, online gambling reported $5.5 billion in earnings – an increase of $1.3 billion from the previous year.
According to the Journal of Gambling Studies, 1.6 percent of the general population has a problem with addictive gambling with an additional 3.85 percent having gambling-related problems. College students top the charts with 5 percent reporting uncontrollable gambling and more than 9 percent reporting gambling-related problems.
Keith Whyte, director of the National Council on Problem Gambling, told the Associated Press, “We believe college gambling is on the increase and gambling on poker has certainly surged. We know that the students were always risk-takers; it is a definition of youth. But we believe kids are now betting more money on more intensive types of gambling.”
According to the National Council on Problem Gambling, there are six types of Gamblers: professional gamblers, who make their living by gambling; anti-social or criminal gamblers, who use it to cheat or swindle others; casual social gamblers, who bet for recreation and consider the losses to be recreation; serious social gamblers, who invest more of their ego than anything; relief and escape gamblers, who use gambling as a binge for emotional problems and compulsive gamblers, which is the most advanced stage of the addiction to gambling.
This type of gambler causes a disruption in their personal and professional life because of their gambling.
Most college students would fall into either the casual or serious social gamblers category, using the game as a form of recreation. According to Gamblers Anonymous, 90 percent of college students make a bet each year, 30-45 percent gamble on a weekly basis and 10-15 percent of those will get into financial problems because of it.
Sielatycki learned his lesson early when his father bet $10 on behalf of himself, his sister and Alex, then lost all $30 within a matter of minutes as a way of teaching his children the dangers of gambling and how easy it is to lose a lot of money very quickly.
“Ten minutes later, my uncle came running into the room after winning $5,000 on the poker tables,” Sielatycki said.
Online gambling only takes a credit card number and an Internet connection, which means almost every college student is at risk. Both state and the federal government have taken note of this issue.
The House passed the Unlawful Internet Gambling Funding Prohibition Act (HR 2143) in hopes of blocking credit card and debit card companies from permitting payment to llegal gambling sites. However, this measure is currently delayed in the Senate.
Democratic Assemblywoman from New Jersey Joan Voss proposed charging a fee to television programs such as Celebrity Poker in order to provide education to counter addiction in students.
In October 2001, anti-Internet gambling provisions were included in the Financial Anti-Terrorism Act that would ban Internet gambling sites from accessing U.S. financial service systems, allegedly to prevent the flow of money to and from terrorist organizations.
Three states: Nevada, Louisiana and Illinois, have banned online casinos. Attorneys General in New York, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Missouri have already used their existing laws to shut down the few online gambling sites based in the United States.
Now almost all online gambling sites, even if owned by U.S. citizens, are physically located off shore so they can avoid U.S. laws and regulations.
-etippetts@cc.usu.edu