The gambling industry, without a doubt, has a lot of consumers; but strangely, most of us think the majority of gamblers are men. According to some reports, it looks like the situation in Sweden is slightly different.
Women To Outstrip Men:
Generally speaking, Sweden’s gambling participation hasn’t changed in the last year, however, the amount of gambling addicts has drastically increased and surprisingly, now women have outnumbered men. As it turns out, currently, they are more addicted to this form of entertainment than the other gender.
Recently, Sweden’s Folkhalsomyndigheten (Public Health Authority) has launched the results that were made by conducting a research concerning gambling habits in this country.
Furthermore, this survey was made last year in August, interviewing more than 5,000 people. According to it, fifty-eight percent of participants were involved in some type of real-money gambling in 2018. Moreover, these results showcase that things haven’t changed since 2015.
What Can We Conclude From It?
Based on these reports, it was inferred that approximately 225k are getting closer to developing problem gambling behavior. On the other hand, in 2015, around 322k respondents were found to be also at the same risk.
Uniformly, the number of people who were having a real problem with gambling luckily decreased. Namely, it fell from 134k four year ago to 101k in 2018.
Although, this may seem like a positive sign, things are not as good as they seem. Why is that? Well, for instance, these reports show that the number of those who are extremely addicted to this form of entertainment has grown in comparison to 2015.
Last year 45k people stated that they are obsessed with gambling, while, on the other hand, in 2015, 31k claimed the same thing. This showcase that the situation has gotten worse.
Who’s To Blame?
For the time being, pundits are pointing fingers at the online gambling industry, claiming that online slots, poker and other casino games are creating this addiction.
Moreover, it looks like in the past couple of years, the majority of people from Sweden were subjected to gambling marketing saturation.
Ardalan Shekarabi, Sweden’s Minister for Public Administration, gave a statement claiming that the government would “put an end to aggressive game advertising.”
Casinos that have been working in the nation’s newly regulated market recently created a voluntary responsible marketing code, however, Shekarabi didn’t find this move beneficial and said that a total advertising ban wasn’t off the table.
This past Tuesday, gambling licensees met with several individuals from the government department, as well as customer authorities, with a goal to develop some form of consensus concerning the government’s decision when it comes to “moderating” marketing efforts.
On a more positive note, this week, Spelinspektionine (A leading Swedish regulator that is continuously working on improving things in the industry) has announced that the number of people from this country who have signed up for the Spelpaus self-exclusion program has surpassed 30k.
Source: “Nearly Two-Third Of Swedish Gambling Addicts Are Women” https://calvinayre.com/2019/04/05/business/sweden-gambling-addiction-women/. Calvin Ayre. April 5, 2019.
