Historically, during economic downturns or periods of heightened social uncertainty, people generally: Lose confidence in the future and seek immediate gratification; face cash flow difficulties but crave overnight riches; Consequently, gambling, lotteries, and speculative trading often flourish against the trend. 📉After the Great Depression in the United States in 1929, illegal casinos proliferated; 📉After the 2008 financial crisis, online gambling and sports betting platforms exploded; 📉During the 2020 pandemic, retail investors' "gambling-like trading" (GameStop, options, meme coins) became a social phenomenon. Today, "gambling" is no longer just about casino chips. It is constantly evolving into speculative behavior with informational value: Stock option markets (betting on volatility) Cryptocurrency contracts (betting on trends) Prediction markets like Polymarket (betting on the outcome of real events) These platforms satisfy the same psychological mechanisms as casinos: Risk, suspense, probability, and immediate feedback. But they have an added layer of "rationalization": "I'm not gambling, I'm pricing the future." The relationship between economic recession and the gambling industry is essentially about the "premium of hope." The root of the gambling industry's prosperity is not wealth, but the scarcity of hope. When overall social opportunities decrease and social classes become rigid, gambling becomes a lifeline for ordinary people to "defy fate." During economic recessions, the gambling industry inevitably prospers; but its form will evolve from traditional casinos → online gambling → financial derivatives → prediction markets; The "truth-revealing layer" of the future world may no longer originate from the news, but from betting odds.