Funding: Damned if you do, damned if you don’t

Funding – for lots of things, but specifically for gambling addiction research and treatment – is a really thorny problem. I mean, it isn’t, or it shouldn’t be. But the reality is very different.

I remember seeing, with my own innocent eyes, a critic of the industry on Twitter (when it still was) saying how the industry should be paying toward research and treatment for gambling addiction. One week later, the same critic was saying how the industry should not be allowed anywhere near funding for treatment or research. Dawg, make your mind up. This is not a topic that needs emotional reactions, it needs hard logic. Or at least consistent logic. Or… well, any logic, because what I read was just bonkers.

It’s 2026, and it’s pretty easy to distance a contribution from the actual end goal or programme. It’s genuinely really simple to do. A donation, or contribution, can be given to an organisation for a specific reason; say, to research the occurrence of gambling addiction in the disabled population. Then the group that’s given the money steps away and waits for the research to be done and published, probably a few years later.

Why on earth would anyone think that the gambling industry would even want to influence such research? I can’t think of much research that the industry even could influence.

One of the main reasons the industry must be involved in research and treatment is, bluntly, we have all the data. Another reason, our critics could and probably should argue is that we may have been a contributing factor to the player’s problems (ignoring a plea for self exclusion, marketing to players that have self-excluded – you know what I’m talking about…). If that’s the case, why on earth should we not be a part of finding out all we can about the problem?

There is very little funding, generally, for gambling addiction treatment, and it is sometimes lumped in with other addiction treatment despite having relatively little commonality with, say, drug abuse. Although, oddly enough, drug abuse can be a significant contributor to gambling addiction, it doesn’t mean the two things require the same kinds of treatment.

I’m a believer that the industry should, in every country with a legal market, pay towards treatment and research. In that order. We don’t have to pay towards research, although I’m sure the funding would largely be welcomed. We could just supply the (anonymised) data without caveats for researchers to do what they do. That would be huge. I know it does happen, but it’s not nearly as prevalent as it could and should be. Quality data is arguably the most important ingredient of research and sharing it with the right people could help the entire industry move the conversation forward.

How could that ever be a bad thing?

Of course, not all funding is created equal… the industry has many bodies doing lots of, I’m sure, super-important work which would go way over my head. Take the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG) in the US. Their work has never been more important than it is now; I believe I’m safe in saying that the US was totally under-prepared for the impact of legalising sports betting post-PASPA. And without a federal framework for guidance or a baseline, each state had the chance to get it wrong in its own special way.

So the NCPG is doing great work, in theory. It’s a non-profit organisation working to advance education on gambling and associated harms. The US needs national organisations in order to support those states that are struggling to keep pace with the impact of addiction issues.

But recently, we’ve seen the Michigan Gaming Control Board (MGCB) leave the NCPG, followed by the Nevada Council on Problem Gambling (NVCPG). Why? Because they are protesting funding the NCPG has received – hilariously enough, the funding in question came from Kalshi.

How the NCPG didn’t see this coming blows my mind. Almost every regulator and problem gambling organisation in the US is aligned against the spread of prediction markets, arguing they should come under the gambling regulator’s auspices, not a federal regulator that has no experience of actual gambling – not to mention gambling addiction.

That means most, if not all, of the NCPG’s members are working against Kalshi and friends. I wonder what due diligence the NCPG did? It feels like they said: “Lads, the cheque’s cleared. You’re in.”

However it went down, the NCPG received a cool $2m for a two-year investment to fund a new “trader health and safety initiative”. It’s barely even pocket change to a company that has seen revenue increase tenfold in 12 months, but that’s not the issue here. The issue is one of trust.

We’ve all seen how money affects the winds of politics. How a massive donation is often followed by favourable words in government, or even nicer laws. It’s been that way for decades. Kalshi is buying favour with this money while trying to look like they really, honestly do care about the people playing on their app.

Buying influence leads to the erosion of trust in any organisation. From the public, and importantly from the organisations you’re in theory there to support. Losing Nevada and Michigan doesn’t just look bad, it’s stunningly awful and I doubt they will be the last to leave.

Kalshi and the others have been saying for months and months that what they offer is not gambling. Definitely, absolutely, positively not gambling. No way, buddy! And I’ll fight anyone that says it is!

Despite being the reason that the NCPG set up a whole new membership category (Financial Services and Trading), it might be worth Kalshi checking the receipt from the NCPG.

That ‘G’ stands for gambling. Hey, if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck and bets like a duck….