Gambling and Speculation: A Theory, a History and a Future of Some Human Decisions.

• Author: Tutterow, Roger

This book provides historical, theoretical and empirical analyses of lotteries and gambling. In this volume, Brenner and Brenner confine the more formal theoretical and empirical arguments to the appendices. In doing so they provide a main text easily accessible to the lay reader.

The first chapter provides a critical history of lotteries. In this chapter, the authors outline the various versions of lotteries which have flourished throughout history and make two interesting points. First, the authors demonstrate that many modern games of chance have foundations in both Judeo-Christian and Islamic religious practices as well as in Greek mythology. Second, they argue that historically lotteries have flourished when either financial institutions were inadequate or when government coffers have been unexpectedly emptied.

In chapter two, Brenner and Brenner consider factors which motivate individuals to gamble. The authors began by discarding the economic model of gambling as a manifestation of a taste for risk as being too simplistic and not illuminating. Models also rejected include Freudian motivations as well as the sociological explanation that gambling surfaces when conventional avenues for social mobility are closed. Rather than these explanations, it is argued that one must distinguish between those games whose primary role is that of entertainment from those which offer the opportunity to become rich. For these latter games, the authors argue that it is relative economic status which separates those individuals who accept risk and gamble from those individuals who reject gambling and insure against losses. Further discussion outlines how a variety of factors including age, education, and income may influence one's willingness to gamble.

The third chapter considers the foundations of the social stigma associated with gambling. The question at hand is whether the redirection of resources and people away from gambling would produce socially preferred allocations. Invoking their dichotomy between those games which provide entertainment and those which offer the opportunity to become rich, the authors suggest two sources of disapproval. For the former games, it has been argued that gambling promotes slothfulness among the working class and hence is detrimental to their work ethic. In contrast, games which offer the chance to become rich have been condemned since they pose a challenge to the status quo. The authors provide numerous historical...