Gambling to the North is Getting Big

April 11, 2008

The Canadian Gaming Association or CGA released a study this week that says that Canadians are participating in gambling in much larger amounts than anyone suspected. According to the study, the Economic Impact of the Canadian Gaming Industry, more than 267,000 Canadian jobs are directly or indirectly impacted by the gambling industry.

This is disturbing for a couple of reasons. Firstly, there are only about 15 million people currently working in Canada. This means that one out of every 50 people is affected by gambling. These numbers are high by anyone’s standards.

Plus, the revenue that comes from the industry is more than $15 billion, which makes it one of the biggest providers in the country. Now these numbers do not include online gambling numbers. In fact, these only include land based gambling in the country.

Now, let’s say you add online gambling to the list. The revenues just went up significantly as soon as you add in the numbers for the Kahnawake portion of the industry.

Not only does it increase the amount of money that the gambling industry brings in, but it also increases the number of people dependant upon it as well. If one in 50 is affected by land based casinos, what does that second number drop to when online gambling is factored in? One can only assume that it would be a significant change.



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