Casinos should be reformed to stop predatory tactics
Last update: July 14, 2026
Casinos don’t simply offer the games and hope people play them, they do everything they can to encourage people to play, even with addicted gamblers. Make that especially with addicted gamblers. (Addiction By Design book, NY Times, The Atlantic, Casino.org, AMCA)
This shouldn't be surprising. For as long as we've had modern companies (i.e. since the industrial revolution), they’ve moved fast to exploit workers, screw over customers, destroy the environment, and inflict cruelty on animals, in the name of profit.
Casinos are in the same boat. The prey on the public, including problem gamblers, simply because they can, because there are almost no laws preventing them from doing so.
One purported slot engineer made a video explaining how game designers exploit players through psychology to get them to keep playing. (YouTube, 2026) Here’s an excerpt:
“There’s a kind of player who has completely lost the thread of why they’re there. They’re not having fun. You can see it on their face. They’re not excited. They’re not socializing. They’re not even really present in any meaningful sense. They’re just feeding the machine mechanically—spin after spin after spin, face blank, body locked in, the world completely gone. And I will be honest with you, I have sat in design meetings where we discuss very seriously, very professionally, how to extend that state, how to deepen it, how to make the machine more effective at producing it. We called it by different names in different contexts—immersion, engagement, flow state. But what we were talking about, what we were actually engineering toward in those moments, was that blank-faced, locked-in, world-gone-away state. And I’m not proud of that.….It is the part of my career that sits uncomfortably in my chest when I think about it quietly—which I do more now that I’m retired than I ever let myself do when I was working.”
Regulators are asleep at the wheel. Casino abuses are extensive and pervasive and only new laws will reign them in. Unfortunately, nobody's pushing for these kinds of laws. There are groups opposing opening new casinos (akin to Prohibition), but nobody working on reforming the existing industry. If I ever have enough time to get a non-profit off the ground maybe I'll start one. Until then, here are some ideas for laws to make casino gambling less exploitative of the players, and especially of problem gamblers.
| Suggested Reforms for Casinos | |
| Problem | Suggested Reform |
| Problem Gambling (addiction, overspending) | |
| (1) It's easy for players to
lose life-changing sums and the casino will never
intervene. Bars are legally required to cut
off customers who’ve had too much to drink, but there is no
such equivalent for people who gamble too much. U.S.
courts have ruled that casinos have "no duty of care" to
compulsive gamblers. Exceptions: (1) Finland limits losses to $600/day and $2500/month. (2021) (2) U.K. imposes affordability checks when:
|
Land casinos must: (a) Require all players to sign up for a Player's Card. (b) Require the card be used for all play (slots and table games) Note: The items below are enforceable only if a card is required for play. All casinos (land + online) must: (a) Have players set daily, weekly, and monthly loss limits when signing up. (b) Cut players off when they've reached their limit. (c) Allow players to self-exclude themselves from further play, letting the player choose either a "cooling-off" period or a permanent exclusion. (d) Punish the casinos for allowing players to play in violation of the above, not the players. (Self-exclusion doesn't work well at land casinos because player cards are not required, and when a player plays anyway, it's the player who gets charged, not the casino.) Affordability checks make casinos confirm whether any player who loses >$x in a one-month period, can afford to do so, and cut them off if they can’t This one is both the most controversial reform as well as one of the hardest to implement. My personal feeling is that if all the other (easier) reforms on this list implemented, affordability checks would probably not be very much needed. |
| (2) Players can't set “cooling off” periods during which the casino must refuse their play. | Casinos must let players self-exclude for any period of time the player chooses, with default options of a week, 1-12 months, 1-99 years. Currently, where self-exclusion exists, the only options are exclude forever, or don’t exclude at all. Some players might choose to exclude temporarily if they could, but they can’t. |
| (3) If a player sneaks in and plays during a self-excluded period, the player is punished. The player is charged with a crime, and the casino faces no penalties. The casino thus has no incentive to refuse play to problem gamblers. | Casinos must face significant disciplinary action
for allowing excluded players to play. If
players must use a player’s card to play in a brick-and-mortar
casino (the #1 suggested reform above), then refusing play for
excluded players is easy. |
| (4) Slot machines are available in grocery stores, convenience stores, and gas stations in some jurisdictions. A gambling addict might have enough will power to keep from going to the casino, but it can be overwhelming if the machines are constantly dangled right in front of them. As one woman said, "I went to the store intending to buy groceries. I left with no money and no food. I'm so ashamed of myself but I don't know how to stop." | Gambling machines must not be available outside of
casinos. |
| Predatory Behavior | |
| (5) Casinos target problem (addicted) gamblers whom they know to gambling problems (marketing, special offers, comps), because there is nothing stopping them from doing so. | Casinos must be prohibited from doing so. |
| (6) Casinos pay bonuses to workers based on how much players lose. (Guardian 10/25) This gives workers an incentive to facilitate and increase player losses. | Casinos must not offer bonuses to staff based on
player losses. |
| (7) Casinos extend credit to customers, especially to customers who run out of money. Some casinos do this even from the slot machines. | Casinos must not loan money to gamblers. |
| (8) Casinos allow customers to get cash advances on credit cards. Anyone funding their play with credit cards shouldn’t be gambling. Credit cards come with both high cash advance fees and exorbitant interest charges. | Casinos must not allow cash advances on credit cards, either at the casino cage or via ATMs. |
| (9) Casinos cash paychecks and Social Security checks for customers, and most actually offer incentives for doing so (like free chips, or free entries in a drawing), clearly enabling problem gamblers. | Casinos must not cash third-party checks. |
| (10) Online casinos and sportsbooks allow deposits via credit card. | Casinos should not allow customers to gamble with
borrowed money. |
| Transparency | |
| (11) Gamblers often have no idea how much money
they’ve lost. |
Casinos must provide month-to-date, year-to-date,
and lifetime loss figures to players, prominently,
on the home page after login for online sites, and on the
screen when a player’s card is inserted into a physical
machine, and players must be able to call up that info again
on demond (e.g., on the home page of an online app, or on a
settings/account page for a physical machine). Yes, this
will require adding this feature to machines; existing
machines can be grandfathered in.
This has been proposed in Australia (2025). |
| (12) Records of deposits, withdrawals, and gameplay
results are often not available to players. |
Operators must make this information available. Brick-and-mortar casinos must allow players to create an online account where players can see: (1) for slots/VP, each deposit, each cash out, the date/time/amount and result of each bet, daily win/loss, and effective return/RTP, (2) for table games, each chip buy-in. Online casinos must allow players to see each deposit, each cash out, the date/time/amount and result of each bet, the balance after that bet resolves, the daily win/loss, and effective return/RTP. NY approved a measure in 2026 to require sportsbooks to send monthly win/loss statements to players. |
| (13) Players have no idea how hard it is to win a slot jackpot. | Casinos must post jackpot odds on every machine, including the number of hours, days, weeks, months, or years of continuous play that it takes to hit the jackpot on average. |
| (14) Players have no idea what the payback (theoretical return) is on slot machines. | Casinos must post the payback on every machine. |
| Unfair practices | |
| (15) Online casinos confiscate winnings of players' winnings when multiple people play on the same device or Internet connection, and don't properly warn players that this can happen. Terms and conditions often state things like "One account per household" and "one account per player". What they don't say is "One account per device and per Internet connection." (more...) | (a) Terms and conditions should specifically say that
winnings can be seized if multiple accounts access the site
from the same device or Internet connection. (b) Burying this in pages and pages of tiny-type T&C isn't enough. On the signup page, there should also be a separate checkbox from the T&C agreement, saying the player understands that multiple accounts on the same device or Internet connection can result in winnings being seized. (Either that, or give players the option to forgo signup bonuses so that the casino will have no reason to seize winnings for having multiple accounts on the same device or connection.) |
| Marketing | |
| (16) Casinos and sportsbooks advertise publicly. |
Gambling advertising should be restricted.
Smoking ads have largely been banned since 1971. Note,
this should apply to state lotteries, also, but even better,
governments should not be in the business of providing
gambling opportunities.
Australia has a partial ban, and the Netherlands is considering a ban. (2026) Yes, the site you're reading now, which suggests banning gambling ads, carries gambling ads. It's how I can afford to publish and maintain this website. If a gambling-ad ban is enacted then I won't be able to continue the site (non-gambling ads pays so little I'd make less than minimum wage for the time I put in), but if gambling ads are banned then I will be the last to complain about it. |
Reforms passed
NY is requiring sportsbooks to send monthly win/loss statements to players. (2026)
It took until 2018 for Nevada regulators to require casinos to cut off players who are visibly under the influence of drugs, but at least that’s on the books now. (Casinos were already obligated to cut off drunk patrons.) (Play Nevada)
Examples of casino predatory behavior
- MGM accused of exploited addicted gambler to the tune of $30 million. “The incentives [by MGM to the player] continued in spite of a subpoena issued to the defendant BetMGM that outlined the extent of Antar’s increasingly reckless behavior.” (2024)
- Caesars fined for plying high roller with alcohol (2013)
- Addiction By Design book