EKIP– Expert Club for Economics and Politics A Different Opinion
In recent weeks, two proposals to ban gambling ads have emerged from remarkably diverse sources. First, Deputy Prime Minister Valeri Simeonov said that gambling ads, specifically targeting the lottery, are "outrageous" and the NFSB is drafting a bill to ban them, and this week, the newly formed extra-parliamentary coalition "Democratic Bulgaria" also came out with a proposal to severely restrict gambling ads on television. The politicians argue that "ticket-scraping" in Bulgaria has become almost an "epidemic" that must be "cured" at all costs...with some kind of ban, of course.
The real problem is the lack of financial literacy
The thing is, however, that bans on gambling ads do not solve in any way the fundamental problem that leads Bulgarians everywhere to squander their money on lottery tickets. And this problem is that our compatriots are massively financially illiterate. Bans on gambling ads will not educate them about why the lottery is, on average, a sure loss of money and will not teach them not to spend their money on nonsense. At most, they will simply lead to them spending their money on other nonsense that may be even more harmful.
It is curious whether any of the local advocates for the ban on gambling advertisements, from Valeri Simeonov to Radan Kanev (what a curious company, huh?) have thought about why people in Bulgaria actually rub tickets en masse. The answer is simple – because they have no financial education. And why don't they have any financial education? Well, because local politicians, yes, the same ones like Valeri Simeonov and Radan Kanev, have not done their job and have not reformed our education system, which is in a tragic and constantly deteriorating state.
In schools (at least in public schools), even a basic level of financial literacy is not acquired. And whatever we say, financial literacy is one of the most useful life skills for every person. This is supposedly the goal of primary and secondary education – to build a good level of general culture in a number of key disciplines. Finance, personal finance in particular, the area of greatest importance for the life of each of us, is clearly not included in this set of disciplines. It is strange why.
Mass ticket-scraping is a symptom. The disease is financial illiteracy. The cure is educational reform that would introduce financial education (and statistics, a must to understand the meaninglessness of the lottery) into schools. Unfortunately, this is too complicated for domestic politicians. They prefer the easier, direct, just-the-fact methods of policy-making. Educational reform requires in-depth planning and...thinking. And they clearly don't have time for that.
Restricting gambling ads doesn't solve the problem, it just imposes unnecessary regulations
You may object that an educational reform cannot solve the problem in the short term, because a very large part of the adult population is already paying for tickets anyway. Yes, that is a fact. And this is in most cases a legacy of the absolutely tragic education system during the communist regime (contrary to all those who love to talk about how much better our education was back then). But banning gambling advertisements will not solve this problem.
First, this ban will not harm the lotteries themselves as much as the advertising agencies. In essence, any ban on advertising will always harm the advertising agencies' business first and foremost, and only then the thing being advertised. Second, there is the fundamental problem – such regulations aim to limit people's freedom of choice, with an incompletely clear argumentation. Do you notice that any of those proposing to ban gambling ads provide any data on the "huge problem" with gambling in our country? Data on how many people are addicted, how much money they spend, etc.?
Nothing like that, the argument in support of such bans is always based on some "feeling" that there is a problem with gambling. Some politician thinks that too many people are rubbing tickets and therefore - let's ban the advertising of tickets! Bravo, this is certainly how quality policy is forged - without data, without in-depth analysis, based only on the personal feelings and speculations of some politician.
And again, in the end, bans on gambling ads do not cure the root problem of the lack of financial literacy among Bulgarians, but even shift the focus away from it. Such unproductive bans give politicians an excuse to say "Look, we're doing something, we're thinking about you," without actually doing so.
