zlacker

Is there a viable way to limit the amounts but still make it enjoyable? I guess the issue is that $10, $100, $1,000 or $10,000 would be different for everyone. I myself only need $10 or $100 on something to "make it interesting".

>>pbreit+(OP)
This may sound crazy, but one way to keep it enjoyable but remove all the negatives could be to allow profit-driven betting only using non-liquidisable, non-transferrable tokens which cannot be aquired or topped up for money. Make the betting industry operate on a flat subscription based model in which token top-ups cannot be correlated with customer payment.

That way gamblers can continue to bet their betting-coins like crazy, show off their big wins, and maybe even exchange large amounts of "earnings" for non-cash prizes, arcade style, depending on what the betting platforms decide to offer to the market. However, win or lose, there must never be a way to top up or increase token wins by spending more money on said platforms.

Edit: Maybe, with effective regulation ensuring gamblers cannot open (and thus spend) more than X simultaneous gambling subscriptions across the market, large betting-token earnings could be allowed to be exchanged for cash prizes, to the extent the gambling platform may consider it profitable. Of course by its very nature this would make top cash winnings orders of magnitude lower than when betting actual money, given the flat income stream. But that would itself be the point, providing no incentive for gambling business to encourage addiction for greater profits.