A week ago, I attended my 2nd
cousin’s wedding. It was a great event, and I’m really happy for him and his
wife. I only really see the family on my father’s side once every couple years
or so, so I don’t have a close relationship with any of them. Anyway, the groom’s
father is a pastor. At the end of dinner I went to congratulate him and say
goodbye, and the first words to come out of his mouth when I shook his hand were,
“Cut out the gambling. I don’t care how much money you make from it, you’re
smart enough to do something better than that.” How amiable. I congratulated
him and left after saying a couple more goodbyes.
It made me pretty angry that that was
all he had to say to me, and after leaving I realized that he hadn’t talked to
me all day even though he had checked up on my brother and sister. After I got
over that, I got to thinking about whether I contribute less to society than I
would with a more conventional job. I can think of two realistic ways one’s
work can benefit society:
1.
Goods or services
produced/provided while working
2.
Unselfish use of
income (or knowledge, or whatever other gains)
Occupations
like farming, construction, or teaching (I feel like the Christian community views
pastors much the same as teachers) are really obvious examples of occupations
that provide a beneficial good or service. On the opposite end of the spectrum,
poker pros don’t really provide a good or service. You could argue that a poker
pro provides entertainment in the same way an artist or a performer does, but whatever.
Some will
argue that poker pros are, in part, responsible for the gambling addictions of
others and actively make the world a worse place, like illegal drug dealers. I
disagree. How about video game developers? Should we outlaw video games because
they’re responsible for burn out gamers who didn’t live up to their potential? Movie
producers? Plenty of people forego school and work so they can chase the dream
of being a star actor.
The more
money one makes at their job, the more they have to spare on others. Even if
you don’t donate to charities or support small businesses that you couldn’t
support if you were poorer, you are still contributing through something that’s
mandatory: income tax. So now the question arises: how much more income tax
does one have to pay to overcome the effective societal burden of not producing
or providing anything?
If I were
working in finance or data analysis or something, I wouldn’t be paying much in
taxes compared to what I’m paying now. I’d be making a contribution to society
with my work, but it’s really hard to calculate how much. Imagine I decide to
only play poker for the next 5 years, and end up giving the government $100k more
in income tax than I would doing something else.
In 2012,
the U.S. is spending the most on Social Security ($610B), Homeland Security
($499B), and Health and Human Services ($315B) (usaspending.gov). In total, the
U.S. will be spending $3.7T in 2012. So that’s 16% on SS, 13.5% on security,
and 8.5% on medical. Over those 5 years, I’d be contributing an additional $16,000 to social security,
$13,500 to homeland security, and $8,500 on medical spending, along with
whatever else the government decides to use the other $62,000 on. Is that more
of a contribution to society than I would’ve made with the services I’d have
provided had I done something else? I don’t know.
I’m not
saying everyone should aim to make as much money as possible, or proclaiming
that poker is more altruistic than teaching (lol?). I’m only trying to debunk
the notion that gambling is an evil occupation that hurts our society. Even poker
pros who aren’t as capable as others, and definitively contribute less than
they would at a more conventional job, shouldn’t be made villains. What happened
to doing something you enjoy for a living? Is that only okay if it’s something less
taboo than gambling? What about other entertainment providers like fiction authors
or actors, are they selfish? Where do you draw the line? Is it not completely
arbitrary?
Comments
welcome. Would love to discuss this more.
John
One line some people draw, besides just the downstream effects (are you enabling the addictions of others etc), is whether the job produces something or just moves money around. I think poker falls a lot closer to that than some of the other examples. You can debate the effectiveness of what each job produces, video games vs romance novels vs football games vs saved lives vs skyscrapers, but each of those does leads to something you can debate the meaningfulness of. Even investing in the stock market, solely for the individual's chances of profiting, leads to companies having additional capital. A relatively successful poker player generates personal accumulation of wealth, and...
ReplyDeleteThe taxes point is marginal at best, because it's not like that income is going untaxed if you hadn't earned it. Maybe you can argue it's going into a higher bracket than if the people you won it from had it, but that might not even be true depending on the circumstances.
I don't think poker is an evil occupation that hurts our society, obviously. However, your family member might have a point with regard to the opportunity cost suffered by society to have someone who would be a successful doctor, lawyer, leader, whatever, playing poker instead. http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/8016432/gladwell-vs-simmons-iv talks a bit about that; athletes that could have been talented in other mainstream professions.
"However, your family member might have a point with regard to the opportunity cost suffered by society..."
ReplyDeleteOpportunity cost is suffered by society every second that every person is not doing as much as possible for that society. It's not really as simple as occupation A being acceptable and occupation B being unacceptable.
"it's not like that income is going untaxed if you hadn't earned it."
Actually, in almost all cases, that's exactly what it means.
It sounds like you are lowering yourself to this pastors nationalistic and narrow way of thinking. I don't believe for one second that you think that your contribution to funding the United States federal government's ability to wage war is a positive externality of your work.
ReplyDeleteThough teachers and pastors touch their communities lives in an obvious way I don't think that their contribution is necessarily good or evil. I have encountered people in both occupations who I believe had especially negative effects on society--they indoctrinate youth with unhealthy world views and reinforce unfair systems of wealth and power.
You are an individual with hopes and dreams, interest and boredom, and you have the right to pursue what makes you happy. Poker enriches your life, bringing it excitement creatitivity and friendship. It brings wealth to your local community and the businesses that cater to your likes and wants. Your contributions to society are your unique thoughts and experiences that you share with the world, and those are certainly shaped in no small part by poker.
Tommy,
ReplyDelete"The taxes point is marginal at best, because it's not like that income is going untaxed if you hadn't earned it."
Pretty sure this is wrong. Maybe 10% of players are gonna come out ahead over a 1 year period, and most of them aren't going to report gambling winnings.
"I don't think poker is an evil occupation that hurts our society, obviously. However, your family member might have a point with regard to the opportunity cost suffered by society to have someone who would be a successful doctor, lawyer, leader, whatever, playing poker instead. "
So do we all have a moral obligation to choose THE most productive profession our abilities allow us to excel at regardless of how much we enjoy it?
Cory,
I'm not lowering myself, I'm just making an argument. I can't force anybody to think critically if my argument doesn't connect with them at all.
Well, I wouldn't argue that everyone should make it their priority to do whatever maximizes the returns for society. If that were true, it wouldn't even be enough for individuals to choose the professions they were objectively BEST at - they'd also have to work to their maximum productivity or else they'd be shaming themselves.
ReplyDeleteI do think that we all generally subscribe to some level of what your relative was saying though, and that some underlying points (if he meant to make them) are not unreasonable per se. Like, everybody showers JaMarcus Russell with derision for being a huge bust, but the whole concept of "busts" in the NFL is someone who had enough talent to do well but just didn't apply themselves. I know I hate Andray Blatche, and think Javale McGee shouldn't be an object of adoration - whenever I watched Javale play I was always hoping against hope that he would try harder, hustle, etc. "Wasted talent" can mean misapplied talent too; you just have to connect the dots between whether "misapplied" = "wasted," and then the moral judgment is how we feel about poker, much of which is tied up in its positive externalities (or lack of them, or negative externalities). I think that generally there are more positive externalities for professions that aren't merely redistributive (the money moving I touched on before).
Society in general isn’t what it once was. In a perfect world, a society is comprised of people coexisting side by side peacefully living within the same geographic area governed by equal and non biased law. In reality, this concept doesn’t exist. Were a group of people coexisting side by side in disharmony living within the same geographic area governed by unequal laws that are practiced in a biased fashion. I believe the key factor that made the United States such a great nation is also indirectly responsible for this transformation in society. That factor being diversity. We are all American citizens but we aren’t of the same exact nationality or race. Every culture has their own thoughts, beliefs, morals, (in a general sense) of what is acceptable and what isn’t. So, even though our country is the same, our personal culture, thoughts, beliefs, morals, and so on are so drastically different that to a degree people tolerate one another, but deep within have their own predetermined views of Americans of “different” ethnicity. If our country, and the societies among it are comprised of people with this mentality, how can we ever truly be united? When contributing to your local society, for example, establishing youth club for boys and girls, a hospital, or a school, you’re contributing to a particular subculture, not society. A youth club for boys and girls within a “society” will benefit the youth (age restriction and specific boys and girls) who attend the club. A hospital is useful only for individuals who can afford it and a school is only beneficial to those of higher education (or striving for it). I’m not saying these contributions are meaningless, they serve profound purposes, but I’m just pointing out that “society” doesn’t benefit from the contribution, specific subcultures do. Part 1 of 2
ReplyDeleteI’m not limiting subcultures based purely on race either because even within that department, there are sub-subcultures too (made that word up) that includes everything in life. The educated / the non-educated, the rich / the poor, the in shape / the overweight, the democrats / the republicans, the / the , the old / the young, and on and on the list goes. If you wanted to contribute to society, without being bias in some sense, you would have to account for every American in the United States and contribute in some fashion that everyone would benefit. I can’t imagine how unless you do something to benefit man kind or the planet. That was a mouthful, but I had clarified that before continuing. Knowing that “society” functions in this fashion with the addition of the majority of the population being in financial difficulties; instinctively wouldn’t you pursue the highest paying jobs (realistically) while simultaneously saving money and only contributing to family? This method is purely survival of the fittest. You’re ensuring that your family, your future family/offspring, and you have the maximum resources available to survive in a situation where those resources are not only scarce, but are continuously diminishing slowly in value. Even if you got a job, like the firm you were telling me about, where you handle big portfolios and such, society isn’t benefitting, the person or group whose portfolio you’re addressing is. If you became a pastor or teacher, the students you teach only benefit, not society as a whole. The advice the groom’s pastor shared with you is the universal feeling toward gambling in general. They aren’t thinking in terms of bankroll, discipline, strategy, but in terms of degeneracy, instability, addiction. He had his own predetermined view (my point earlier) of gambling in his eyes and shared it feeling it was necessary since he has confidence in where you’ll be if you continue on the same path. Even though his advice was coming from his heart (he obviously wants the best for you), but that doesn’t necessarily mean the advice applies to you (John). You’ve put many long hours and hard work into establishing your skills (bankroll as well), while at the same time learning money management, self-control, patience, discipline, ect. Thru poker you achieved what some people will never achieve in their entire lives. (and I don’t just mean money wise, but personality / social characteristics). One should be proud of those accomplishments, not feel guilty or resentment because the outlet of where you achieved those things was a form of gambling. Alright, enough jibber jabber for one day. Part 2 of 2.
ReplyDelete