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Message: [QUOTE="Tero, post: 6233011, member: 415793"] Short answer - YES. To understand this "problem" one has to first view the big picture. Finland started regulating money involved games in the 1930's, and since then the control over things has only grown. Today, Veikkaus is the milking cow that most people don't want to get rid off. Veikkaus receives over billion euros from the pockets of Finns every year. Its profits are given to non-profit organizations, and for support of science, culture and sports, but many get paid along the way. It has about 1600 employees, it spends over 20 million/year for marketing, and in the upper levels of the organization there are also Finnish politicians. Many of the non-profits whose existence is based on helping those who have a gambling problem get a large part of their funding from Veikkaus, so even they prefer the status quo. During Covid all slot machines (over 15 000 of them) were taken offline. This caused a huge hit in Veikkaus' revenue which decreased over 30 percent. All the non-profits are now scared for their funding and there have been talks that Finnish government would take over the payments. All this has been like a gasoline to the flames. Today I took another look at Veikkaus' site and found a more recent (2021) study about gambling problems. It says that only 1.8 percent of Finns have a some sort of gambling problem. They credit themselves for this improvement even though it is clear that Covid restrictions played a big part in this. When the money transfer blocking idea was introduced to the public, high numbers were thrown in the air. It was said that around 300 million/year could be blocked, and this could be channeled towards common good. Non-profits and others were glimmering with dollar signs in their eyes, and all were showing the green light to this hideous legislation. But that was just an estimate without any real proof. Now that estimate has decreased down to 4-12 million. It is still an estimate cause no-one knows. You say that 80 percent of Finns gamble? That might be true but one has to be accurate about the terminology. Lottery is undoubtedly the most popular game in Veikkaus' history. Many people, from all walks of like tend to play it, if not every week but often. The main prize is often couple of million euros, and the dream of winning big must be the allure that has kept that game a float for decades. So people play but they don't spend fortunes on it. Even a euro is enough to take part. It is even a popular social thing in many workplaces where people play it as a group, and sometimes they get lucky. It that sense, huge amount of Finns play but it doesn't make them gamblers, or individuals with a problem. I would say that gambling is not a bigger problem in Finland than it is in most countries. The sole reason of this legislation is to protect the Finnish gambling monopoly and keep it alive as long as possible. At the beginning of Finland's journey in the EU there were some obstacles created by EU, since one of the basic principles of EU is to protect free commerce. Finland having a monopoly over its gambling was, and at some level probably still is, a red flag for EU. But Finland has made its case that it is protecting its citizens from harm by doing so, and so far EU has bought this explanation. How long this will continue remains to be seen. [/QUOTE]

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