[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 150 (Tuesday, October 20, 1998)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2240-E2241]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  AS GAMBLING SPREADS THROUGHOUT THE STATES SO DOES GAMBLING ADDICTION

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. FRANK R. WOLF

                              of virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, October 20, 1998

  Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, as the 105th Congress prepares to adjourn, I 
want to bring to the attention of our colleagues an important issue 
which, unfortunately, hasn't seemed to register with many of America's 
leaders. But it's one that needs our focused attention, and that's 
gambling.
  Twenty years ago, if you wanted to gamble you had to go to Atlantic 
City or Las Vegas. But today, gambling has spread in one form or 
another to most of the 50 States. There are only two States which have 
completely banned gambling, and that's Utah and Hawaii.
  One reason for the incredible rate at which gambling is spreading is 
through the proliferation of gambling casinos in many States. I 
certainly respect Native American Indians, but I'm really concerned 
about the number of gambling establishments on tribal lands.
  For those of us who say we really care about Native Americans, we 
need to show our concern about what gambling is doing to them. A new 
University of Montana Bureau of Business and Economic Research study 
found that Native Americans in Montana have a compulsive gambling rate 
that is double the rate of other adults in the State. My point is that 
as gambling spreads throughout the States, so does gambling addiction. 
Montana is just one State that has a real battle on its hands. The 
Montana study found that 78 percent of Montanans gamble, and that 
figure is regardless of income, education, age, sex, and marital 
status. Compulsive gambling rates are on the increase, the study also 
said, up from 2.2 percent of the adult population six years ago to 3.6 
percent now.
  First, gambling is corrupting the political process. I have mentioned 
before my concern about the incredible amounts of money the gambling 
interests are pouring into the political process. Both sides are taking 
the money--Republicans and Democrats. And we are reading news reports 
more frequently than ever about one government official after another 
being investigated for gambling-related corruption, from an ex-governor 
and his son to even a member of the President's cabinet.
  Second, it's hurting local businesses. People only have so many extra 
dollars to spend on food and entertainment. If they're spending their 
disposable income at the new casino in town, that's money that the 
local restaurant doesn't get, or the movie theater, or local retailers. 
Local business is being cannibalized by the casinos. Mom and pop 
restaurants can't compete with the discounted and even free meal deals 
at the gambling operations.
  Another thing that happens when gambling comes to town is that crime 
goes up. The U.S. Treasury Department has been increasingly concerned 
at the way casinos attract criminal elements and suspicious activity, 
especially money-laundering and has proposed new regulations that would 
require casinos and card clubs to report to Treasury any suspicious 
transactions of $3,000 or more. Of course, the casinos are fighting 
these regulations tooth and nail. But the fact is, a cash-heavy 
criminal can find a safe haven in a casino. Drug dealers, armed 
robbers, embezzlers--these kind of people can walk in, buy a few 
thousand dollars worth of chips, then turn them in for a casino check 
later that night and can go relatively unnoticed.

  Just a few months ago, four employees at some casinos in Atlantic 
City were arrested in a sting operation as they allowed undercover 
agents to launder more than $400,000 in what they allegedly believed 
was drug money. so the Treasury Department is concerned for good 
reason.
  But crime is not the only issue. We are in a period of record 
bankruptcies all across the country, so much so that we had to 
appropriate money to pay for more bankruptcy judges. Studies have shown 
a significant link between gambling and bankruptcy, even 
geographically. Where there are more gambling facilities, there are 
more bankruptcies. This is an issue that must be addressed. It is out 
of control. Just the other day, a federal judge in Memphis said that 
because a woman had a gambling addiction problem, she didn't have to 
pay back the $8,200 in gambling debts she ran up on her credit card 
just before she filed for bankruptcy. Is there any doubt that the 
gambling issue must be addressed if we're talking about bankruptcy 
reform?
  But not only bankruptcies increase when gambling comes in. 
Tragically, so do suicides, The American Association of Suicidology 
published the study ``Elevated Suicide Levels Associated with Legalized 
Gambling'' in the Winter 1997 issue of its journal Suicide and Life-
Threatening Behavior. The study, which was conducted by Dr. David P. 
Phillips of the University of California at San Diego, found that there 
is a link between gambling and suicide.

       Las Vegas, the premier U.S. gambling setting, displays the 
     highest levels of suicide in the nation, both for residents 
     of Las Vegas and for visitors to that setting,

the study said.

       In general, visitors to and residents of major gaming 
     communities experience significantly elevated suicide levels. 
     In Atlantic City, abnormally high suicide levels for visitors 
     and residents appeared only after gambling settings were 
     opened. The findings do not seem to result merely because 
     gaming settings attract suicidal individuals.

  But how do people get to the point where they're ready to take their 
own lives? It can actually start at a very young age. We're seeing and 
hearing more and more these days about how gambling is hurting young 
people. And by ``young,'' I'm talking about small children. Some 
critics, including Ed Looney, executive director of the Council on 
Compulsive Gambling of New Jersey, say that amusement arcades teach 
children that gambling is okay, and that it opens the door for later 
problems.
  According to an article last month in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, 
gambling cities such as Las Vegas have tried to fashion themselves into 
``family-friendly'' entertainment by providing casino arcades. But most 
of the games in the arcades, the article says, are gambling devices. 
The biggest difference between what's happening to the parents on the 
casino floor and what's happening to the kids in the casino arcades, 
the article says, is that ``the kids are ripped off even more than the 
adults.''
  ``These are not pinball machines or video games to afford 
entertainment time for the 

[[Page E2241]]

money,'' the article says, but they are ``virtual slot machines 
designed to turn money over quickly. One watches the children in the 
arcades with dismay. Many exhibit the same agitated and frustrated 
demeanor of gambling-addicted adults as they pump their coins into the 
machines.''

  Gambling proponents say they are concerned about unattended children 
in casinos. That new found concern may have been spurned by high-
publicity cases like the one last year in a Primm, Nev., casino hotel. 
A 7-year-old girl from Los Angeles, a second-grader, had been playing 
in and around a casino arcade, left on her own, while her father 
gambled. She was raped and murdered.
  Syndicated columnists Don Feder and William Safire have both written 
recent op-ed articles decrying the gambling industry's targeting of 
children. In a recent column, Feder reported that the Las Vegas Hilton 
spent $70 million on a ride called ``Star Trek: The Experience.'' Young 
people waited for hours in line to get on the ride, and the line 
stretched through a gambling area. Hundreds of kids took the 
opportunity to play the slot machines, Feder reported. Something tells 
me the casino was not at all unhappy about this experience. If they are 
to exist in the future, they have to seduce the next generation of 
customers.
  Consumer advocate Ralph Nader is saying the same thing these days. 
``The idea is that parents will feel less guilty if they are subjected 
to family entertainment, and that the next generation of gambling 
addictees must be given attention,'' Nader said at a recent speech in 
Washington, D.C. ``The gambling industry is as brazen as the tobacco 
and alcohol industry,'' Nader said. ``It is even more brazen.''
  More and more teens are finding themselves trapped in a web of 
gambling from which they can't break free. The New York Times printed a 
shocking front-page story about this a few months ago. The article 
cited a study by Harvard Medical School's Dr. Howard Shaffer, who 
published a recent study which found that young people are becoming 
addicted to gambling at a rate almost three times higher than that of 
adults. The article also cited a Louisiana State University study which 
found that one in seven 18- to 21-year-olds in Louisiana were problem 
gamblers. These are young people with a ``chronic and progressive 
psychological disorder characterized by an emotional dependence on 
gambling and a loss of control over their gambling.''
  The 1996 New Mexico Survey of Gambling Behavior conducted a similar 
study and found that more than 85 percent of New Mexico's 18- to 
through 20-year-olds gamble. More than 66 percent said they had gambled 
in the previous month. Out of the 85 percent of young people who 
gamble, 37 percent said they were having gambling problems and 12 
percent said they had a serious problem with gambling. The study also 
found a strong link between gambling behavior before the age of 21 and 
the development of serious gambling-related problems.
  In New Jersey, gambling among teens is on the rise, according to the 
Council of Compulsive Gambling of New Jersey's Edward Looney. Looney 
says there is gambling in every high school in New Jersey, including 
gambling which is backed by organized crime. One survey of high school 
juniors and seniors reported that 30 percent gamble once a week at 
casinos, race tracks, on sports--including their own school's sports--
on the lottery. According to the state's statistics, 91,754 juveniles 
were arrested or evicted from New Jersey casinos in 1997 alone. Out of 
this number, 329 were found gambling on slot machines and 114 at 
tables. There were 38,502 teens escorted from casinos last year, and 
52,364 were turned away at the door when they tried to enter illegally.

  But there's more. Not only is gambling hurting moms and dads and 
young people. But it's also hurting grandma and grandpa. According to a 
recent article in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the spread of legalized 
gambling across America has led to financial ruin for many senior 
citizens. In Iowa, the article said, three years after riverboat 
gambling was introduced, bingo and casino gambling became the number-
one pastime of choice for people over 65 years of age in the Omaha 
area.
  Is that what each of us envisions for ourselves when we think about 
retiring? Spending our Golden Years addicted to gambling? I don't think 
so. But that's what's happening, all over America. The gambling 
industry says it's concerned about problem gambling among the elderly. 
But when you read their trade publications, ad after ad features grey-
haired men and women beckoning seniors to ``join in the fun.''
  Mr. Speaker, the fact of the matter is, many American people are 
starting to wise up to what's really going on here. As they are 
watching friends, neighbors and their own family members sinking in 
gambling's quicksand, they are speaking up and standing up against this 
blight on our nation. In state after state, voters are making their 
voices heard, loud and clear. They don't want it in their communities. 
Take casino gambling, for instance. Out of the last 21 efforts to bring 
in casinos nationwide, all have failed but one, and that one, in 
Detroit, Michigan, won only by a very slim margin. Even now, the 
citizens there are seeking to overturn that decision.
  What is needed in our country is for our community leaders and 
elected officials to hear the voice of the American people on this 
issue, for they have indeed spoken. They have seen that gambling is bad 
for their families, bad for their communities, bad for their kids. It 
is destructive. It is dangerous.
  I could go on and on for hours citing cases and studies. We have 
reports piled high in my office. But I think what I've shared with you 
today is enough of a taste--a bitter taste--of what gambling really 
means for a lot of people.
  This is a problem that is national in scope. That's why we had to 
pass legislation which the President signed into law to establish the 
National Gambling Impact Study Commission. The commission is over half 
way through its two-year comprehensive evaluation of gambling's impact 
in America, including open meetings all across the country, and is 
expected to report its findings by next summer.
  We need to wake up. It is wrong to allow government to become the 
predator of the people. Think about this the next time gambling's high-
priced lobbyists show up at your door with a campaign contribution or 
an offer to put on a ``high-dollar'' fundraiser.

                          ____________________