The legal gambling industry in Alberta has rapidly expanded over the last three decades. One of the main justifications that the Alberta government uses for this expansion is that gambling provides increased revenue to governments and community groups which is then used to fund public programs. However, critics argue that the social costs of legal gambling offset these benefits. One particularly controversial social cost of gambling is the impact that gambling has on crime. The academic literature is split with as many studies showing an increase in crime due to gambling as those that show no impact. The current study investigated how increased legal gambling availability has affected crime in Alberta. Four different sources of data were examined: the self-reports of gambling-related crime among problem gamblers in population surveys, mentions of gambling-related crime in police incident reports, uniform crime statistics from Statistics Canada, and information supplied by the Alberta Gaming and Liquor Commission (AGLC). The most unambiguous findings of this study are that gambling-related crime constitutes a very small percentage of all crime; crime that is gambling-related tends to be non-violent property crime; and increased legal gambling availability has significantly decreased rates of illegal gambling. In terms of the impact of legalized gambling on overall crime in Alberta, the evidence would suggest that legalized gambling likely has a minor or negligible impact. / x, 123 leaves ; 29 cm

Relatively little is known about Canadian casino employees. The present study is a broad-based investigation intended to shed some light on this population. There were several specific areas of investigation. These included job satisfaction, substance use and abuse, gambling behaviour, gambling attitudes and beliefs, and problem gambling status. Because of this high-risk group’s excessive exposure to gambling, casino employees’ gambling behaviour may be indicative of the general adult population’s future gambling behaviour. Although there is some prior evidence of higher rates of problem gambling in this population, the causal direction of this relationship is not well established. That is, does working in a casino place employees at a higher risk for problem gambling, or does the industry actually attract problem gamblers? The present study investigated the characteristics of 123 Canadian casino employees from two Alberta casinos. The study aimed to establish the actual impact of casino employment on substance use and gambling behaviour by means of a follow-up questionnaire that was distributed six months after the baseline questionnaire was collected. The results of the follow-up questionnaire tentatively suggest that problem gamblers are attracted to the casino industry, rather than the casino industry placing its employees at a higher risk for problem gambling. The study also found that Northern Albertan casino employees have higher rates of smoking, alcohol use, illicit drug use, medication use, gambling, and problem gambling than the general Albertan workforce. / viii, 140 leaves ; 29 cm. --