At least 53% of adult Filipinos (62% of men, 43% of women) engaged in some form of gambling in 2005. In geographic terms, 60% of adults in Metro Manila gambled, 61% in overall Luzon, 53% in the Visayas, but only 32% in Mindanao. Urban settings averaged 54% participation in gambling v. 49% in rural areas.
As we have observed in previous studies, the notion that gambling preys overwhelmingly on the lower socio-economic classes isn’t supported by statistics. In the Philippines, gambling participation amongst the bottom rungs of society was 45%, but this figure rose to 58% for those on the more fortunate end of the pay scale.
In gender terms, male gambling preferences were (from top to bottom): lottery, card games, cockfighting, jueteng and bingo. Women also put the lotto at #1, followed by jueteng, card games and bingo. On the contentious question of whether jueteng “damages public morality”, non-gamblers believed very firmly that jueteng was one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, while the response from jueteng players was closer to ‘meh’.