Almighty Dad | A stay at home dad blog

An interesting thing happened when I taught my kids how to gamble – they loved it.  For those of you who don’t know how to play 5 Card Brag, it’s quite simple.  You deal 5 cards and each player discards the two they don’t like.  The object is to make a prial (3 of a kind), a running flush (3, 4, 5 of the same suit for instance), a run, flush, pair or just a high card in the absence of anything else.  Everybody throws in a certain amount before the hands are dealt and then, after everybody looks at their cards and discards the worst two, they go around betting, folding or seeing until someone wins the pot.  It’s a little like poker but it’s easier.  It’s a bluffing game.  Anyway, I taught my kids how to play using our penny jar as the money supply.  Until, that is, I noticed they weren’t taking their pennies seriously (Neil was trying to bet his whole stash on the fact that he possessed a pair of 10′s).  Every hand was a bluff.  I quickly remembered that I am a parent, and that’s when my parenting abilities engaged.  Time for a lesson. 

Suddenly It’s not so Fun: 

First I said to them “Okay, we’re going to make a new rule.  You can only bet a maximum of 3 pennies on your turn.”  I proudly sat up straight, in awe of my great parenting.  One hand later I was defeated.  They had gone around and around and still managed to bet everything on stupid hands.  Then I said, “I’ve got it!  Whatever you win is yours to keep.”  Ta da!  Now that they were playing for keeps they would surely be more judicious with the pennies.  Nope.  The pennies were gone in one hand again.  One last effort.  “Boys,” I said.  “Go get your piggy banks.”  And they looked confused and said “Why, Daddy?”  And I said “Because you’re going to use your piggy bank money instead of the pennies from this community jar.”  A chorus of “We don’t want to play anymore!” is what followed. 

Parenting Tip: 

1. To teach your children the value of money they must use real money, money that represents the product of their labor, not real money that comes from a magic, perpetually filling jar that lives on top of the fridge. 

The Psychology of Gambling:  The Gambler’s Fallacy 

I’m happy that my kids sensed the risk of gambling their own money and saw the probabilistic reward for what it was — chance.  The Gambler’s Fallacy (otherwise known as stupidity) states that your luck or fate is what is driving a hand of cards, a pull of the handle or the spin of a wheel.  Some people think a coin that has just turned up heads 8 times in a row is due to come up tails on the next flip.  Or, perhaps, that it’s going to continue to be heads because luck is with it.  Obviously there is no luck involved; the coin has a 50% chance of being heads on the next flip, just like it did on the previous 8.  And that’s how gambling works and why casinos always win.  Gamblers who rely solely on their ability to read a tell or worse, believe in luck, always lose in the long run; they must also understand probability and play judiciously. 

Gambling is not in and of itself bad, but when the player begins to think they are lucky or that it’s their turn – that’s when reality, our inescapable companion, tries it’s best to prove them wrong.  As long as my boys know the odds and never believe the gambler’s fallacy, I’ll be happy.  They can gamble if they like it, but not if they don’t fully comprehend the game – the whole game, including the psychological tricks.

Related posts:

1. Things They Don’t Teach You In School