American women play a very strange game. Can't recall its name, but it's played in a large hall by several hundred women seated at tables with a number of small cards before them. A man on an elevated platform constantly calls out numbers to which the women listen attentively, never saying a word. Then suddenly one woman shouts at the top of her voice: "Bingo!" and all the others exclaim, "Aw nuts!"

Scarne's Complete Guide to Gambling

Although the above account is that of a bemused Englishman's first reaction to bingo, it represents a common-and inaccurate-perception of one of America's most popular and widely played gambling pastimes. Contrary to popular belief, bingo cannot be categorized simply as a parochial, low-stakes game played by middleaged and elderly women.

It is, rather, a billion-dollar industry (much of it illegal) whose popularity permeates all aspects of American society, and the abuses of which often go undetected or unremedied.

Bingo nonetheless holds a unique position among the various forms of gambling: Many people do not consider it true gambling at all. Because bingo sessions are usually run or sponsored by charitable organizations-churches, synagogues, service clubs, and the like-people tend to attribute to it a respectability they would not accord, say, numbers playing. Bingo operations-lawful or notfunction so openly and are so numerous that many players never question their legality. And some would argue that the amount of money an average player spends on an evening of bingo-less than $6.00-is too small to be considered "gambling"; rather, they see it as an "entertainment" fee.

Background

The origin of bingo is obscure: It has variously been reported as an English, Dutch, or Swedish game. One gambling authority says it developed from the Italian parlor game of lotto, which in turn was based on the Italian National Lottery, now 450 years old. Another source claims it evolved from keno, a lottery popular in New Orleans in the 1840's. Revised forms of lotto and keno are still played today.

Whatever its origin, bingo has undergone a number of changes over the years. The 1863 American edition of Hoyle lists bingo as a game played with dominoes. In the 1920's, movie theaters had bingo nights, which were actually raffles intended to increase business and circumvent State laws prohibiting such activities. At these raffles, the winner of a drawing would shout "Bingo!" to claim his prize.

Mechanics

Modern-day bingo, also known as beano, is a simple game, based entirely on chance and played until a participant wins. The games are often held in lodges, halls, church basements, and permanent "bingo parlors." Long tables are set up, and at each seat bingo cards and covering chips are placed. The cards, made of cardboard or paper, are printed with five rows of five squares each. One letter of the word BINGO appears over each of the vertical columns. All of the squares contain a number, except the "free" center square. Numbers 1 through 75 are used. The "B" column usually contains any five numbers between 1 and 15; the "I" column, any five between 16 and 30; and

so on.

The purpose of the game is to cover enough called numbers to form a pattern-usually a vertical, horizontal, or diagonal line, or four corners. There are also many special games and gimmicks designed to increase participation.

In a typical game, the announcer calls a letter and number, randomly selected from 75 ping-pong-type balls printed with a letter from the word BINGO and a number from 1 through 75, in the same groupings as the cards. As these numbers are called, the balls are placed on a master board containing all the letters and numbers to form a record of the game.

The two most popular devices used to insure random selection of a ball are the bingo cage, a wire mesh sphere which is twirled to mix the balls and then stopped to allow one ball to fall out of the bottom, and the bingo blower, a glass enclosure in which the balls are kept aloft by a jet of air until one ball falls through a small opening.

When a person-or persons-shouts "Bingo!" the announcer and a floor person check the cards against the master board. If the cards tally, the winner or winners receive their prizes and a new game begins. As many as 90 or more games may be played at a single session.

Volume of Business

Because so much of bingo playing is illicit, and because reporting procedures are unreliable or nonexistent even in some States where the game is legal, a total estimate of money wagered on the game is impossible to make from official sources. So, too, for different reasons, is an estimate of the total revenue raised by the States through bingo licensing and taxation. An official of one State, however, has said privately that bingo there was a "huge" business, unpoliced, underreported, and answering only to the whims of local authorities. An indication of the success of the game can be seen in New York, where in 1 year the reported handle alone was nearly $200 million (from

About the only consistent factor in the States' treatment of bingo is their requirement that licensing be restricted to operations that are charitable in purpose. (A few States allow county governments, labor unions, political groups, or service clubs to conduct games as well.) In Michigan, for example, bingo licenses are issued only to "Religious," "Educational," "Veterans," "Fraternal," "Service," and "Senior Citizens" groups. (It should be noted that despite the ostensibly philanthropic motivations attributed to /bingo sponsors, only 2 percent of the players who

responded to the Commission's survey said they played bingo because it was in a "good cause." And in Nevada, where bingo is a commercial game like any other, the participation rate is higher than elsewhere.)

The authority for licensing and controlling bingo playing also varies widely among the States. In most, the State government is the licensing agent; in others, the county or other municipal government issues the permits; in Rhode Island and Nevada, authority is divided between State and local government.

The amount of the license fee, its distribution to the State and the community, and the manner in which it is imposed also differ greatly in the bingo States. Where there are license charges, annual fees range from $10 (e.g., lowa) to $200 (e.g., Illinois). In some States, the operator is charged a fee every time a bingo event is held. In few cases does the fee appear to be prohibitive.

Gambling Survey Results

The National Gambling Commission's survey of American gambling practices and attitudes revealed that bingo is a popular form of gambling whose appeal transcends specific sex, age, income, and education delineations. Nineteen percent of the population played bingo in 1974 (table 5-62). Of all types of gambling, legal and illegal, only lotteries enjoyed a higher participation rate than bingo, yet the bingo handle in 1974 was double that of the lotteries.

Because of the game's wide appeal, it is difficult to develop a profile of the "average" bingo player. Although the stereotype of a bingo player is a woman, 16 percent of the male population played bingo in 1974-more than bet on the horses or placed sports bets with bookies. The stereotypical bingo player is middle-aged or elderly, yet the survey results show that players under 25 had the highest proportional representation among all age groups, while players over 65 had the lowest.

Yet the stereotype is not entirely a myth. If all bingo players are divided into three groups on the basis of frequency of participation, the popular image of the bingo player appears among the 8 percent who play once a week or more. Middle-aged and elderly women, widows, and those earning under $5,000 a year are highly represented among the "heavy" bingo players. But among the great majority of players-the 75 percent who play less than once a month-distinctions on the basis of age, sex, name, marital status, and education are obscured.

Following are additional highlights of the survey results: 1. Bingo and Family Income (table 5-63). The average annual wager by bingo players earning under $5,000 was $142 in 1974; players in all but one of the other income categories wagered less than $100. The average annual wager for all players combined was $74. Only lotteries and sports cards had lower stakes.

Bingo is one of the more regressive forms of gamblingthat is, those in the lower income groups spend proportionately more of their income playing it than those in higher income categories. It is less regressive, however, than numbers or sports cards, and about the same as State lotteries.

2. Reasons for Playing (table 5-64). Despite bingo's association with charity, most people do not play for charitable reasons. Bingo is viewed more in "social" terms than other forms of gambling; most players play "to have a good time," or for excitement or challenge. Less than a fourth of all players cited the chance to make money or to get rich as a reason for their playing. Among nonplayers, lack of interest was the primary reason given for not participating. About a third of the nonplayers cited money

TABLE 5-63.-FAMILY INCOME AND BINGO PLAYING

reasons. Adverse moral, legal, and societal consequences of playing bingo were rarely mentioned.

3. Legal Versus Illegal Bingo (table 5-65). Fully 44 percer: of those living in States where bingo is illegal believe it is legal, making bingo the form of gambling about which public knowledge is least accurate. The confusion may be partly due to the game's close association with respected community institutions such as churches and charitable groups and to the fact that a number of States permit charitable exemptions to their lottery and bingo prohibitions.

Of all forms of gambling, only bingo received majority support for legalization among people who live in States where bingo is currently illegal. Twenty-two percent of the nonplayers who did not know that bingo was legal in their State said they would play if it were legal. This represents a large potential market for the game.

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Despite bingo's popularity as a charity fundraiser and its reputation as a harmless pastime, it has been the object of abuse by a number of sources: Illegal parlors resort to tricks to circumvent the law or openly defy it. Racketeers are thought to control bingo games-legal and illegal—in a number of urban areas. Skimming and other scams are practiced by both organized groups and shady independent operators. Some bingo players have devised elaborate cheating schemes.

Law enforcement officials appear to be of two minds regarding illegal or crooked bingo: One group feels that it is not a problem-and indeed, it often is not—or that the public wants it and the police have the responsibility or enforcing the law to the extent that the public desires. The other group, which feels crooked or illegal bingo is a problem, must often contend with an apathetic public and no investigative resources. It is probably fair to say that regarding illegal bingo operations, the police are damned if they do and damned if they don't.

ILLEGAL BINGO PARLORS. Some operators, to circumvent licensing requirements or statutory prohibitions, merely avoid using the word "bingo" and charge a fixed fee for a night of entertainment. That entertainment might consist of recorded music and "free" bingo games. At least one State has ruled that bingo is allowed if it is provided free during a paid entertainment. Other operators simply conduct open-and illegal-games, either moving from place to place and chancing the occasional police raid, or paying police officers to ignore

the violation. In any event, penalties for bingo violations in most States are minor and can be looked upon as a business expense.

RACKETEERS. Bingo takes in nearly $2 billion a year. Laws regulating bingo may be unenforced or ambiguous, and it is easy to rake off substantial unreported amounts of money taken in at the games. Thus, it is apparent that national or local organized criminal groups would be interested in bingo as a source of illicit income. A number of cities report that a single commercial bingo operation runs the majority of charity-sponsored games.

Some States have legalized bingo and set up control boards not to increase State revenues but to provide State supervision of games thought to be controlled by organized crime-particularly organization-sponsored games run by commercial operations. Legalization gives the States control over licensing and access to bingo records.

Even where the police want to investigate bingo operations thought to be infiltrated by racketeers, public sentiment often is against it. The bingo-playing public feels that an innocuous source of pleasure is being taken from them while the police ignore "real" crimes such as robbery. Churches and social organizations often sponsor the games despite the crime involved; the money these games bring in may be their charity's only source of support-even if the charity is not receiving its fair share from the dishonest bingo operators. State and local governing bodies are unwilling to spend the money needed to finance a thorough investigation of an area's bingo operations. And laws surrounding bingo may be so ambiguous that cases actually brought to court are often dismissed, and the few penalties imposed are rarely more than minor fines.

SCAMS. Skimming-the practice of underreporting income from games and pocketing the difference-is thought to be the biggest problem regulatory agencies and law enforcement officials have with bingo. Skimmed money is tax-free: Not only do the Federal, State, and local governments not receive their share of taxes from that income, but State or local governments that base their license fees on the income from a bingo parlor or that receive a percentage of the take also lose revenues. And the charities these games ostensibly support, as well as the players themselves, lose.

Skimming is easy to do and hard to detect because bingo players pay cash. To prevent skimming, both the number of players and the number of cards they play would have to be counted for each game. With thousands of games played at hundreds of bingo sessions each week in a given locality, it would be practically impossible for a municipality-even assuming it had the resources and the inclination-to check each operation. (A private survey of three bingo sessions in a large mid-western city found one session's take underreported by $1,000; the second by several hundred dollars; and the third to be even.)

Most bingo scams are simple: Not all games are reported to the regulatory authority, and the bingo operator merely pockets the money from the unreported ones. Skimming is even easier if the floor workers are involved: For