gambling summit

[jimmym]

True and a shame.

It looks like the UK is going to become the major player in online betting control with the backing from the goverment. I think this is a good thing and will offer good security for both the players and the sites that join, offcourse there will be a fee payable in taxes by the sites and this fee will have to be recouped by the sites through the players but it will offer security and I suppose in the long term this is good.

I cant understand why the US dont come on board as Tessa Jowell has said what the US goverment has done will only lead to Crime and turn good citizens into criminals and just for having abit of enjoyment and with there own money.

Prohabition wont work it hasnt in the past and never will. I feel that if the UK set up good relations and security working with online gambling sites the pressure for the US to come on board will happen soon.

Anyway back to the latest on the gambling summit.

[jimmym]

Well not much news from the gambling summit, the media gave it the usuall 15min of glory mainly interviewing a few loses who managed to use up all there money because they were allowed to and they dont have a problem its the sites fault ect ect.

I hoped eejit would have been interviewed giving his take on it and how easy it is for any1 to make a few pound ot 56k.

the bbc have had a message board running and a few quotes for and against have appeared. lots of thought and effort to just sign up and then again the usuall braindead posts,

If two players each have a finite number of pennies and begin to toss them with the winner keeping the penny. Each player has a 50% probability of winning. Now repeat the process until one player has all the pennies.
If the process is repeated indefinitely, the probability that one of the two player will eventually lose all his pennies must be 100%.
P1 = N2/N1+N2
This means that the probability of winning is linked to the number of pennies. Casinos have more pennies so will always win.

American attempts to prohibit alcohol failed. You cannot dictate to people and legislate against gambling it won't work. Not being a gambler myself I fail to see the attraction in giving aways money for an illusary gain. Leave these people to get on with their lives. We are only here for a short time make the most of it.

f the government can make money out of people gambling, then I'm all for it.
Maybe it'll distract them from thinking up new taxes to impose on normal folk.

I have just read the article about Vicky Clark running up a £27000 debt via internet gambling. I'm sorry but I don't have an ounce of sympathy. Why should the Government put restrictions on these if people like Vicky can't take responsibility for their actions -tough!

this last made me laugh the site gave her back the money she lost, because they didnt want bad press...fucking stupid I think..

"I think all form of gambling should be outlawed there will be fewer people with gambling addiction and fewer people with gambling debts" - dianna lyew, birmingham

I suggest you read up on 1930's prohibition in America. People will gamble if they want to, it's their right if that's what they want to do with their life.

Banning only puts it in the control of criminal gangs.

So there we have it,,Gambling Online is great,,If you live in the UK pay your taxes and spend what you cant afford..I did notice though that the Media didnt interview any players who were winners at all, perhaps we have NONE.

[Penguinfan]

I'm probably in the minority, especially on a board like this, but I am all for taxing things like gambling, cigarettes, alchohol, resturaunt food, sporting event tickets, concert tickets, etc...

I see no reason not to tax the things people are spending their extra money on, IE, things they don't need. Why just blanket raise the property or income tax that will affect people who can't afford it and probably will see zero benefit from the tax.

I just got my partial season tickets to the Penguins in the mail and I have no problem with the extra $3-$5 a ticket I paid in taxes on them, I would have bought the seats at $85 as opposed to $80 anyway, and it's something I don't have to have.

Let the people who have/spend the most money pay the most taxes, I will never have a problem with that.

Funny that people who gripe about cigarettes going up 20 cents a pack really never look twice at the $6 ATM fee in a casino.

[Talking Poker]

We're off topic here, but I'm with you. I have no problems with luxory or sales taxes either.

During the last elections, there was a vote to raise our sales tax by ONE PENNY (1%), which was of course defeated. So, property taxes went up instead. The money has to come from somewhere - I say let it come from the tourists, and not from the property owners. For the most part, Florida does a pretty good job with this - there are no state or local income taxes here (this saves me thousands of $ per year over what I used to pay in PA), thanks mostly to huge taxes on hotel rooms, rental cars, etc. Let the tourists pay!

Oh, about the salex tax thing, items like food and clothing should be exempt, of course, and for big ticket items, you'd only have to pay on the first $5000 (50 bucks). It's not like you'd have to pay this when you buy a new car, etc... People are stupid though, so naturally it was shot down.

[Kurn]

Well, I have a problem with taxes of any kind. I realize that they are necessary for government to function, but that doesn't mean that more is good.

The problem is best described this way.

1) You have no choice whether or not to pay.

2) As soon as you accept the idea that government is a repository of funds that can be used to "improve" society, people and groups will start lining up with "good ideas" for how to use this money.

3) Since the sum of "good ideas" and the money necessary to fund them (demand) will always be greater that the total of tax money available (supply), there will always be pressure on the government to increase tax revenue. basic economics. When demand exceeds supply, prices rise.

And I'm not putting quotes around "good ideas" because i think they're all bad. Some of these ideas sound good to me. However, in a pluralistic society what X group thinks is good, Y group may think is bad and the result is if X group happens to have the majority it gets to impose its will on Y group *and* force Y group to help fund the idea.

So what I'm saying is that while I don't think it is right for the US government to try to stop online gambling, I am completely opposed to them regulating it and taxing it. At least philosophically, that is.

[Talking Poker]

No one likes taxes, but let's be realistic here. Do you really want to not have a police or fire department, for example? Or would you rather people just get 5 and 6 figure bills (that they won't be able to pay) when they need to use said services?

Surely you are ok with us having roads and bridges, and understand that these things are not free to build or to maintain, yes?

One thing I will give you is school taxes. I don't understand why a homeowner with 0 kids has to pay for other people's kids to go to school. Meanwhile, the renter with 5 kids pays nothing. Yes, I understand it's for the general good of the community to educate the children, but I'm never quite understood why THAT money comes out of property taxes.

[Penguinfan]

The person who owns the building they are renting pays the taxes for the 5 kids in your example.

Everyone shares the burden of school taxes simply because it would be too expensive to break it down per child. I see what you are saying, but the reality is most people wouldn't be able to afford to send their kids to even public school if they had to bear the burden themselves.

Just in my school district the teachers make about 60K with about 20 kids in the classroom, I'd have to pay $3000 per year per child just for the expense of a teacher, not to mention the cost of the building, administration, activities, transportation, etc.. It would add up to a ton more than I pay in taxes now I am sure.

[Kurn]

The personal federal income tax accounts for less than 50% of all faderal tax revenue. You could cut that in half and still cover things like law enforcement and whatever portion of federal dollars go to fire (though I think that's mostly state & local). Highways would also be OK, since a lot of that is funded by gasoline taxes (I have no issue with use taxes).

My point was not to eliminate taxes all together, but to control them. A flat, capped income tax is the best way to go. We cannot demand fiscal responsibility from government as long as there is no systemic way to prevent tax increases...Massachusetts, for example, has very good public schools, yet property taxes are constitutionally capped.

The point is to lower them by a significant percentage and then take action to cap them.

I have an example, but I'll start another thread.

[jimmym]

Its Ironic in a way that Taxes have come to the forefront of this topic, when I say Ironic I mean The UK has for the past few years taken away all tax on gambling, so now when we put a sports bet on we dont pay tax at one time we use to have to pay 17% of the wager upfront or have 17% of the winnings deducted.
If we win now we dont have to pay tax either in sports betting or online games, I think that only proffestional gamblers have to pay tax, but my understanding is that the perks such as claiming outlays such as travel, clothes ect result in virtually no tax being paid.
I understand the UK goverment want to make its money from the sites and bookmakers these costs must be recuiped from the customer how each does this I dont know.
But I again feel that with our Goverment has a hidden agenda somewere down the line.
I too agree with taxes if there spent on the right things or used by the Goverment to better the thing they have taken tax for.
With our Goverment putting in so much effort to regulate Online gaming surely taking a tax from the players that win and from the Gaming sites profits is a nice earner but that doesnt mean because they are paying time taking the taxes and checking the sites profits will result in better gaming with better regulations and security, its the idiots who gamble on credit and dont when to stop is the problem.
Perhaps the Goverment should better regulate the credit companies who seem to lend to anyone with a pulse, I mean even a person on very low income can now get the lowest loan from credit companies and do this over and aver again using 100s of different companies, a example of this is earlier this year we applied for a car credit loan on a major supermarket credit site, we had over 50 responses from differnt companies all offering us 10.000 credit immedietley, thats over half a million for a car. Now thats what needs regulating to me.