> I see no problem with betting on who will win a sports match...

I do wonder - what if the sports teams or politician loses intentionally; which could either be to profit off the loss or due to threats from an actor who seeks to profit?

I heard that Kalshi paid out for when Khamenei was killed in Iran (the bet was for when he would go out of power), so murdering people could be another way to win such a bet on who will lose. Even injuring a sports player could easily change a game result. With so much money on the line, it doesn't seem like a good mix.

Athletes (both college and professional) frequently receive threats from sports betters. Since the betting apps let you make specific wagers such as whether a specific player will make more than 6 three pointers in a game the harassment can become quite targeted.

Let me make an obvious opposing argument: what is the social benefit in allowing people to gamble on the outcome of a sports match, or any other event? We encourage investment in the market in theory to allow companies to grow and produce things many people might benefit from (how well that works is another thing...). Gambling as far as I can see is net negative to everyone but the winners, and not entirely positive to them. Imagine if your next door neighbor dropped a cash-filled envelope that you found - lucky you? And if that was your neighbor's rent money? Like a lot of scams, the 'value' is only accrued by fleecing rubes, and it also creates a new class of super-bookies, which also not positive.

You're asking the wrong question, in a free society (supposedly) people are allowed to do whatever they want by default. They're not perimtted to do things, they're forbidden from doing specific things.

Is gambling a neg-negative? why do you care? how is that relevant? Things shouldn't be forbidden because of net impact, specific harm needs to be outlined and addressed. Most of the time, there are more specific problematic behaviors that should be legislated against, not gambling.

In your example, that person spending their rent money could maybe addressed by the law? Or if someone spends their family's savings on a bet, that specific behavior can be addressed. If you think about it, this lazy approach doesn't address root causes. Maybe that guy's rent money, or family's savings, he could have blown it on a fancy car, no law against that.

Conversely, what if someone bet all their money on a stock option? People kill themselves over this, but it isn't illegal. you see how the entire approach is crooked and lazy? categorizing "gambling" addresses the reactionary emotions of the crowd, it doesn't address root causes, it doesn't evaluate nuanced situations.

It isn't betting or speculating that is the problem.

That's a strong libertarian position I think few would agree with. A similar case would be fentanyl - what harm does it do to me if people are dying on the sidewalk from overdoses? Well, the cumulative impact of that on society is considered negative enough that we've outlawed its recreational use. That argument of course doesn't apply equally to my neighbor taking shrooms, which doesn't have any impact, go ahead. The question is if you see gambling as closer to fent than to shrooms - I would suggest that it has a significant blast radius[1].

1: https://commonwealthbeacon.org/by-the-numbers/sports-betting...

No, I must disagree. With Fentanyl you can prohibit the substance just fine because it causes phsyical harm to its user, although even then I personally think so long as the seller educates its users well enough, it should be allowed.

If what you're bothered by is fact that people are dying on the streets, that's pretty grime, maybe make that illegal so they can find a less visually unappealing way of dying?

Consider this: How many people commit suicide? How people do __NOT__ commit suicide because fentanyl bought them something to chase after for a little while longer? How about we worry about all the people that die because they can't get enough medical care? Why is society quick to neglect that, and yet so eager to take away liberties for drug abuse? Or homeless too, I suspect you wouldn't want homeless people sleeping in tents on the street either, because that bothers you visually?

Your neighbors on shrooms are just as dependent on drugs as someone on fentanyl, so clearly you don't care about the dependency factor. If you care about mortality, then address the top causes of mortality.

Even with fentanly, people overdose specifically because it is illegal. In a sane society, people would be able to get fentanly administered to them in free facilities/clinics that give them correct dosage after doing a quick check on their blood chemistry. That would be cheaper than pumping junkies full of narcan every day, dealing with body clean up, all the crime that comes with the criminality of it all, and other costs to society. Same as with home with homelessness you could just give people free housing and that would be a lot cheaper, and it will solve the visual displeasure you have as well.

But the cruelty and hypocrisy is the point of it all isn't it?

Bankers and investors at major cities are cocaine junkies, that's a well known fact. In some states, being a weed junkie is highly normalized. being addicted to cigarettes and alcohol (which both have a well established mortality rate, and high cost to society!) is normalized, even celebrated at times. A junkie with needles on him by the street bothers you, but the same junkie with a bottle of beer and a blunt might not.

As I argued earlier, with gambling you're focusing on the wrong thing, gambling is the how, not the what. Every argument you make about "gambling" can be made about day trading stocks, or betting on options. People take risks they shouldn't think with money in a way that affects others, that interaction should be legislated, and some costs (not criminal) should be imposed by society on people that do that, targeting both the platform/house and the participants. The solutions are highly nuanced though, they're not as lazy as "just ban gambling", and they have costs associated with them that people don't want the government to subsidize, but in the long run are cheaper.

Should I be able to spend my life's savings on a corvette or an RV, without the seller asking how that would impact those around me, or how I would survive if additional costs arise later on? If I end up homeless, or my family becomes destitute because of that decision, the "blast radius" to society is the same as if I did spent that money at a casino. If your concern truly is "blast radius" then that could be addressed directly, root caused solved at the root.

I'm not a libertarian for the record, I'm simply trying to analyze the problems at hand and find the best solutions.

The social benefit is that it gives a controlled outlet for the need to gamble when managed by the government.

One major utility of prediction markets is to get good estimates of probabilities of future events.

That's an interesting idea, though of course while we've done that with crop or livestock futures, we seem to have coped pretty well without betting on absolutely everything until now.

We usually cope well before inventions improve things.

I don't know if prediction markets will be an important improvement, but it might be, so we should let them run.