Front pages:

2008

March, 2008

February, 2008

January, 2008

2007

December

November

October

September

Aug. 14 - 30

Aug. 1 - 13

July 25 - July 31

July 24 - 26

July 7 - 24

June 26 - July 3

Clyde Barrow answerers critics

5/12/08 In a letter to The Standard Times, 'Casino culture' rhetoric is just that , Professor Clyde Barrow answers his critics at that paper and elsewhere. Most important to readers of this website, he addresses concerns about measuring the social impacts of gambling:

With regard to the social costs of problem gambling, we state that "if a comprehensive analysis attempts to estimate the economic costs of problem gambling in terms of revenues lost to businesses due to bankruptcy and embezzlement, the cost of gambling addiction treatment, and losses to other individuals due to fraud (e.g., credit card theft), there are still numerous technical difficulties that have not been solved by economists, survey researchers, and public health analysts."

It is beyond me how a call for more empirical research on these important questions constitutes a dismissal of these concerns, particularly since one of our recent "casino studies" was actually an attempt to measure the prevalence and social costs of problem gambling in Massachusetts.