This week, Americans will legally wager an estimated<\/span> $3.3 billion<\/span><\/a> on March Madness, a 54% jump from just three years ago. That number says something important about what happens when you let adults make their own choices in regulated markets rather than pushing them toward offshore bookies in the shadows.<\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019ve spent a decade as a consumer advocate, watching nearly every wave of moralist and neoprohibitionist crusading: alcohol, cannabis, nicotine pouches, fatty food, caffeine, red meat, sports gambling, and prediction markets. Plenty I wouldn\u2019t touch. Others I moderately enjoy. But I\u2019ve never once lobbied my congressman to ban any of them \u2014 because I\u2019ve also watched what happens when governments do.<\/span><\/p>\n The Atlantic<\/span><\/i> recently published a gripping <\/span>year-long account<\/span><\/a> of sports betting that ends with its writer, McKay Coppins, a Mormon dad from the suburbs, filing a self-exclusion form at 5:00 a.m. after the Super Bowl. The magazine gave Coppins $10,000 to experiment with gambling.<\/span><\/p>\n As an inexperienced bettor playing with earmarked money from his bosses, Coppins describes feeling \u201cseduced\u201d and asks how it is that Americans think, \u201cunlike every civilization that came before us, we can beat the house.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n But his ending proves a worthwhile point: the voluntary self-banning request form he eventually signs exists only because sports betting is properly regulated in the United States. Offshore bookmakers don\u2019t have such an off-ramp.<\/span><\/p>\n Gabby Jones\/Bloomberg via Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n There is a growing pile of commentary from writers and activists who have cast themselves as chaperones for everyday Americans who might enjoy a little risk. <\/span>Call them compliance cops: the prediction market writer who <\/span>only covers<\/span><\/a> why prediction markets are bad, the crypto journalists fixated only on harsh regulation, or the energy reporter <\/span>more interested<\/span><\/a> in advancing climate mandates than covering the innovations that will actually power tomorrow. And of course, tech journalists who want to <\/span>ban data centers<\/span><\/a> at the precise time we need them more than ever.<\/span><\/p>\n That compliance-cop pattern repeats everywhere. State regulators are issuing <\/span>cease-and-desist orders<\/span><\/a> against prediction markets like Kalshi, which is federally regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, but is putting pressure on incumbent sportsbooks. It\u2019s not dissimilar from how taxi permit holders <\/span>spent years<\/span><\/a> trying to legislate ride-sharing out of existence. Consumers and new entrants are always the main losers when incumbents write the rules.<\/span><\/p>\n Call it the American moralist streak. Call it the prohibitionist impulse. Whatever name it goes by, it persists no matter the product or pastime.<\/span><\/p>\n The answer, however, isn\u2019t to abandon all guardrails. We\u2019re not choosing between Sodom and Gomorrah and the 17th-century Puritanism of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. <\/span>Licensed markets with basic age-verification rules let people access nicotine pouches or cannabis without unregulated alternatives where product safety is a gamble in its own right. Regulated gambling is better than shady offshore sites gaining market dominance with zero accountability.<\/span><\/p>\n Meanwhile, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is barnstorming the country demanding bans on synthetic food dyes, restricting SNAP benefits for candy and soda, and redesigning what Americans may eat. This year, 18 states will <\/span>block SNAP purchases<\/span><\/a> of sugary drinks. Wanting cleaner labels is reasonable \u2014 deciding which snacks food-assistance recipients may buy is not.<\/span><\/p>\n The MAHA agenda\u2019s answer is always a new ban or restriction when transparency and consumer choice would better serve the public. Oftentimes, the most effective public health measures aren\u2019t mandates.<\/span><\/p>\n The principle is simple: if an activity primarily affects the adult who chooses it, and that adult accepts responsibility, the government\u2019s job is to minimize harm at the margins, not to decide the activity shouldn\u2019t exist.<\/span><\/p>\n Prohibition never ends demand. Not for alcohol, not for cannabis or gambling, not for the countless pleasures Americans have been told are bad for them. Every failed ban produces the same result: a thriving illicit market, greater danger, and no fewer users. <\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019ve made my choices. Americans should be free to make theirs \u2014 somewhere safe, regulated, and above ground.<\/span><\/p>\n * * *<\/p>\n Ya\u00ebl Ossowski is deputy director of the Consumer Choice Center.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/dw-wp-production.imgix.net\/2026\/03\/GettyImages-2235428749-1-865x576.jpg\")
<\/p>\nCompliance Cops<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Food Bans Or Consumer Choice?<\/strong><\/h3>\n