Survey: younger Australians losing interest in gambling

A new survey shows Australians are gambling less these days, while the country’s telecom watchdog continues its campaign against allowing Australians to access forbidden online gambling content.

The latest report from Roy Morgan Research, which involved talking to 7k individuals in December 2018, found that 47.9% of Aussie adults (roughly 9.3m souls) reported gambling in some form over the previous three months. That’s down from 50.1% in December 2017 and from 64.7% in December 2008.

The decline is notable, as Australians have long dominated global gambling participation surveys. The most recent H2 Gambling Capital stats showed Australians were the biggest gambling losers in 2017, with per adult gambling losses of US$958, well ahead of runner-up Hong Kong ($768), Singapore ($725), Finland ($515) and New Zealand ($454).

All types of gambling products reported activity declines in Australia over the past decade, with lottery/scratch tickets posting the biggest decline, falling from 56.4% to 40.1%. Australia’s ubiquitous video poker machines (pokies) were down nearly 12 points to 13.7%, betting declined 5.9 points to 9.4%, keno dipped 3.1 points to 5.1% and casino table games fell 1.3 points to 2.5%.