Australia's Gambling Industries - Productivity Commission

double counting. In this case, a reasonable adjustment may be the share of total
mentions of all possible causes — which reduces the importance of gambling to 3.1
per cent. ABS data 4 suggests that there were 51 370 divorces in 1998. This implies
that there were around 1 600 gambling-related divorces in Australia in 1998 and
another 1 600 separations (next year’s divorces) that might be ascribed to gambling,
or 3 200 divorces and separations altogether. 5
Of course these numbers will ignore the breakdown of relationships outside of
marriage. There are likely to be a significant number of these, particularly since the
highest risk group for problem gambling are the young.
Table T.1
Reasons for relationship problems
September 1998
Divorced or separated Other marital status Total
NM SNM SS NM SNM SS NM SNM SS
No. % % No. % % No. % %
Loss of a job 20 6.9 15.5 170 7.3 13.4 190 7.3 13.6
Work or study demands 28 9.6 21.7 323 13.9 25.4 351 13.4 25.0
Having or bringing up children 34 11.7 26.4 301 13.0 23.6 335 12.8 23.9
An accident or traumatic events 32 11.0 24.8 266 11.5 20.9 298 11.4 21.3
Financial difficulties 54 18.6 41.9 345 14.9 27.1 399 15.3 28.5
Serious illness or disabilities 24 8.2 18.6 252 10.8 19.8 276 10.6 19.7
Gambling 9 3.1 7.0 48 2.1 3.8 57 2.2 4.1
An affair 20 6.9 15.5 80 3.4 6.3 100 3.8 7.1
Alcohol or drug abuse 24 8.2 18.6 142 6.1 11.2 166 6.4 11.8
Violence 13 4.5 10.1 49 2.1 3.8 62 2.4 4.4
No major difficult times 19 6.5 14.7 297 12.8 23.3 316 12.1 22.5
Some other cause 12 4.1 9.3 45 1.9 3.5 57 2.2 4.1
Don’t know/can’t recall 2 0.7 1.6 5 0.2 0.4 7 0.3 0.5
Total 291 100.0 225.6 2323 100.0 182.5 2614 100.0 186.4
a ϕ NM is the number of times the factor was mentioned by a respondent. Respondents could mention more
than one factor as a contributor to relationship problems. SNM is the share of total mentions for each
category, and will sum to 100. SS is the share of the total sample (which was 129 for people who were
divorced or separated and 1 402 altogether). SS will sum to more than 100.
Source: Data provided by Relationships Australia and Bateman and Conroy (1999).
4 ABS, 1999e, Marriages and Divorces, Australia, Cat. No. 3310.0.
5 Another possible indicative method of estimating the share of divorces is to examine the ratio of
problems caused by gambling to alcohol and drugs in the Relationships Australia survey and
apply that to the AIFS study. This yields an estimate of gambling related divorce share as 3.1/8.2
x 7.4 = 2.8%.
DIVORCE AND
SEPARATIONS
T.5