Isn’t that what gambling is all about. You’re always hopeful that you can get something for nothing, or at least very little. Don’t you remember what your mother told you? You can’t get something for nothing. That’s what my mother told me, and I’ve found out since then that she was absolutely right. I think Wilson Mizner said it best, when he said, “Gambling: The sure way of getting nothing for something.” Really, at the end of the day, that’s it…..right?
In the great state of Montana they have these wonderful little machines, known as keno machines. These keno machines are everywhere, and the places that these machines reside are called “casinos”. I put casinos is quotes because they aren’t casinos like you think of casinos. There are no table game or slot machines, just video poker and keno machines. In any case, I managed to get myself roped in to the dream of winning a couple hundred bucks in a sitting. The next thing I knew I was going back to these machines almost daily. After a couple of months of this I realized that no one really wins. Oh sure, you might win fifty bucks here and there, but over the a period of time your just feeding the machines five dollar bills like they were candy.
I managed to check myself and I don’t even go into the “casinos” any more. I’ve met people who honestly almost lost everything they have playing the stupid keno machines. The thing that gets me about this type of gambling is the fact that casinos will advertise on the radio that they have an 85% payback rate. This is the rate because it’s mandated by law. A 85% payback rate sounds wonderful, but when you think about it this simply means that if you put a dollar into the machines it gives eighty five cents back . This is how it works. Just think of it as a reverse ATM. When I started thinking of gambling in these terms, I stopped.
I suppose that’s my goal with this article. To get you to realize that you really can’t win, no matter what other people tell you. As Doc Holiday said in Tombstone, “The odds are all on the house.” That and only that is the only reason there is even a place on this planet called Las Vegas. Because the odds are all on the house.
Trevor Kugler – Co-founder of JRWfishing.com and founder of yourmoneyconnection.com Trevor has more than 20 years of fishing experience, and raises his three year old daughter in the heart of trout fishing country….Montana.