There is undoubtedly a lot of justified controversy about playing the pokies. Many that are against gambling feel that these machines, along with other forms of gambling, are addictive. Thus, by having the casinos on-land or online is just compounding the gambling addiction problem.
Positive Factors
There are many positive factors to the pokies industry, and many feel it is unfair to blame this form of entertainment on addiction. The industry has taken many necessary steps to help combat gambling addiction, although it is not responsible in its entirety for this particular problem.
Accepting Player Responsibility
Ultimately, it comes down to every individual, having to adopt responsible gambling, and police themselves, when it comes to their gambling actions. Aside from pokies being a major form of entertainment for many, it is very beneficial to the Australian economy, as it is for many other countries.
How Much Money Do the Pokies Contribute to the Economy?
Recent studies have shown that the pokie machines have contributed $6.1 billion to the Australian economy. That is a staggering amount of money. Then, added to the value of pokies, the government is forecasting increases in their tax revenues generated by the pokies.
Why are the Economic Benefits of Pokies so Important?
The importance comes from, where the money generated for the country goes. It goes towards whatever the government sees fit to spend it on. This is money that can, and does, go into schools and hospitals.
Additional Benefits
Other benefits that get forgotten about is the impact that the pokies have on employment. Land-based casinos need staff to run their operations, which creates job openings. The online casinos also require staff. Then, don’t forget, with there being such a big demand for pokies by the players, that the software providers need staff as well.
So, overall there are a lot of important and significant factors, related to the pokies benefiting the economy.