Legal Versus Illegal Gambling: How is Gambling Regulated?
There is always going to be a legal version of something and an illegal version, this also applies to gambling. Though there are plenty of states in the United States and all over the world where gambling is in fact legal and there is where you will find casinos or gambling boats. Illegal gambling is much more secretive and harder to find for the average person. What is the difference between legal and illegal gambling aside from the fact that one is against the law? When you have legal gambling you know that a casino is regulated by the State's Gambling Commission, these commissions are designed to keep an eye on casinos and how they are running their games.
For example, Gaming Regulations in Montana, in Montana their gambling includes Video Poker, Video Keno, Live Card Games, Sports Pools and Casino. They also have Slot machines, Roulette and Black Jack. Their gambling commissions approve all of the gaming machines that are brought into casinos and they run background checks on employees who are then licensed to run the gambling tables. So you cannot just walk off the street and become a dealer, you have to be checked out and have a license that is approved by the State.
In Nevada, their commissions offer licenses to Casinos and they regulate about 1,800 slot machine licenses and over 5,000 gaming tables. The Gaming Commission also taxes and audits casinos on a quarterly basis and they require all casinos to carry insurance on all of the money they have coming in. When you gamble in the states of Nevada, Montana or New Jersey and any state that has legalized gambling, you know if something goes wrong or a casino fails to pay you are covered since the casinos are regulated when you have illegal gambling there are no regulations and no where to turn if you have trouble getting paid from a win.
How a casino is regulated is up to each State but gamblers do not think about if the game they are playing is being regulated they care about the win and the money. It is only when they lose they complain but there is nothing a legal agency can do for you, you don't have what the law calls Clean Hands, this basically means that you were doing an illegal activity and you want to collect based on a loss. So if you are a gambler then your best bet is to stick with legal gambling.
That is risk that you run when you gamble, you know a casino or casino boat is legal because they would have been shut down by now if they weren't, a casino set up in someone's basement is not legal and you will have to take your chances. You have much more to lose by gambling illegally then you do sitting at a slot machine. Next time you feel the need to gamble, buy a lottery ticket.