US operators join advocates to tackle military gambling addiction crisis
As gambling becomes increasingly accessible across the United States, concern is growing about a largely hidden crisis among military personnel. With slot machines operating on overseas bases and digital betting available at their fingertips, service members are twice as likely as civilians to experience gambling problems. Veterans and responsible gambling advocates are calling on lawmakers to prioritise research, screening, and treatment before the issue further impacts military readiness and mental health.
Dave Yeager remembers the moment it started. “As soon as I sat down, the first thing I noticed was that my shoulders started to relax. Then I won, and it was like a dopamine hit. In that moment, all of the fear and anger and stress that I was feeling just went away.”
That moment, at a base slot machine room in South Korea shortly after 9/11, marked the beginning of a gambling addiction that would nearly cost him everything. “Suddenly and without warning, a night of gambling here and there became a seven-day-a-week addiction – one that had me phoning home for more money, pawning personal effects and stealing from my unit,” Yeager told Andrew Lawrence from The Guardian last year.
Growing calls for recognition and support
In a joint op-ed published on 31 July 2025 by the National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG), Yeager and fellow veteran Rich Taylor, now director of responsible gambling at BetMGM, write: “We’re also both veterans—one Soldier, one Marine. And while our experiences with gambling couldn’t be more different, we’ve come together with a shared concern: the military’s quiet struggle with problem gambling.”
The scale of the issue is difficult to grasp, in part because of a lack of federal data. But the signs are alarming. “Servicemembers are twice as likely as civilians to experience gambling problems,” Yeager and Taylor write. “In fact, the rate of suicide among veterans who seek treatment for gambling addiction is startlingly high. Roughly 40 percent have attempted it.”
Their experiences echo findings in academic research. A 2024 study by Mark van der Maas and Lia Nower found that “problem gambling scores for past and current military service members were more than double that of the civilian participants.” It also revealed that “the rate of suicidal ideation among active military members was 20 times higher than civilians.”
Despite these figures, efforts to address gambling addiction within the military remain limited, according to the two advocates. Although Congress mandated annual screenings in 2019, Yeager and Taylor say that “those screenings now run up against a deeper problem: there’s almost no federal research on gambling addiction in military populations.”
A vulnerable population, a high-risk environment
The U.S. military operates more than 3,000 slot machines on bases in 12 countries, generating over $100 million annually, according to The Guardian.
Lia Nower and Van der Maas’s research points to systemic vulnerabilities: “Constrained options for leisure coupled with the high propensity for risk taking among military service members and the relative ease of concealing online gambling on base may expose military service members to disproportionately higher risk of Gambling Disorder.”
Their study also found troubling gender disparities. “The relationship between problem gambling scores and military service was significantly stronger for women than men,” it reports.
Call for research, not blame
Yeager and Taylor argue that the industry, policymakers, and public health experts must work together. “Industry has a role to play in promoting responsible gambling and supporting evidence-based research. Advocates and public health leaders need the tools to help people recover. And Congress has the opportunity to lead by making sure we’re not flying blind.”
“Earlier this summer, 24 state affiliates of the National Council on Problem Gambling, along with FanDuel, BetMGM, and MGM Resorts, signed onto a letter urging Congress to make gambling addiction an eligible research topic in the upcoming Peer-Reviewed Medical Research Programme (PRMRP),” explained Taylor and Yeager. “That request has already earned backing from Senators Elizabeth Warren (Massachusetts), Richard Blumenthal (Connecticut), Ben Ray Luján (New Mexico), and Angela Alsobrooks (Maryland).”
“This isn’t about blame,” the NCPG op-ed concludes. “It’s about doing better for those who serve, and those who’ve already served. We’ve seen what happens when the warning signs are missed. We’ve lived it. It’s time we started understanding it.”
