Mobile gambling targeting society's poorer elements?
I read an interesting article in the February 2006 edition of the gambling industry publication Betting Business, in which it was suggested that apparently surprising facts have emerged about the composition of the mobile gambling public: far from the expected busy executives killing time between meetings, flights and bridge games, it emerges that the majority of mobile gamblers are in fact from the poorer levels of society - I quote: "cash customers at the lowest extremes of the demographic spectrum".
Charles Cohen, CEO of games supplier Probability, speaking at the Mobile Gambling Summit in London last month, had the following to say:
That these gamblers are not from the higher strata of society is further emphasised by the fact that they do not, by and large, have bank accounts. Cohen goes on to say:
As a result, "money shops" have had to be set up across the country to allow the mobile gamblers to cash their cheques - a more expensive alternative, but the only way they can receive their money.
Is this surprising? It's an acknowledged fact that other social vices, such as smoking, drug-taking and even drinking, tend to be most prevalent in the poorer levels of society, those levels in which education and parental guidance may be most lacking.
It would follow logically that mobile gambling, the most recent social "vice", is going to target those same elements of society that can least afford it.
