I'm not saying this in a snarky way but in a, cool thing you can learn about today: look up the multiplier effect in economics. The long and short of it is every additional bit of spending creates more than that amount of spending in the total economy.

Example:
Bob was going to save his $100, providing 0 economic boost, but instead takes it to AC for an evening of poker fun
Borgata gets $10 of rake from Bob, which they use to pay Sally dealer, Lisa floorwoman, and Chelsea chairwoman.
Sally, Lisa, and Chelsea spend their paychecks on goods and services
Joe pro poker pro wins $90 off of Bob
Joe spends these winnings on goods and services
The people who profit from everyone buying goods and services continues the chain
and so on and so forth.

Anyone who does any sort of spending cannot be a drain on society in the economic sense (moral sense of course you can debate, but that's not really what we're talking about here).

Actually, that's what my point 1 is answering.

You see, when you give your $100 to Microsoft for a license for Windows, you receive something of value which you can then use to do other things of value that produce for society. And Microsoft, on the other end, can also spend it and produce a multiplier effect on its end too.

On the other hand, if you just give $100 to your brother, there's only the multiplier effect on his end as he spends the money. Nothing is produced for that money.

Poker winnings are simply, in economic terms, transfer payments. One person has more to spend, another has less, and nothing gets produced.

You have effectively stated the reason why futures markets used to be outlawed. Going down the tangent rabbit hole, but futures markets used to lumped in with illegal gambling/betting. The truth is that for the most part, the regulators were correct that futures markets were betting. I wrote a paper in college that poker should be legal because futures markets are because 100 years ago, futures markets were illegal because poker was.

But back on our already tangential topic, the transfer of poker funds in a public game also generates rake. That rake is your purchasing a service from the house. So $100 to Microsoft buys you a good, $100 in rake to Borgata buys you a service. Let's say you only have $100 to spend. If you go to Borgata, you lose $90 to Joe and pay $10 in rake, so you generated less economic value than if you'd paid Microsoft $100. I won't argue with you on that. But I'm countering the claim that poker has so economic value, not that poker has maximum economic value.

P.S. Interesting that you chose Microsoft for your example as there is a decent amount of controversy regarding the economic value of their business model. Since the variable cost of selling a software license is effectively 0, "suppliers can supply an arbitrary quantity at a given price," to quote this article: https://blogs.oracle.com/bmc/the-economics-of-software. The effect is software vendors act as natural monopolists, which may be anti-competitive, and, you guessed it, a "drain on society"! I'm not saying I necessarily do or do not agree with this viewpoint, but just an interesting aside.

To be clear, I actually have somewhat left-wing economic views and think a lot of economic activity is a "drain" (or at least not beneficial). And software is an example of it.

I was just making clear that other than rake (which you have a very valid point about), poker winnings are generally just transfer payments and transfer payments are not seen as having the same economic value as the purchase of goods or services. And that certainly should be taken into account when assessing the value of playing poker to society.

An old 2+2 book, maybe more than one (probably one of Malmuth's poker essays), said that professional poker players provide an entertainment service to losing poker players who decide they would rather spend their entertainment dollar playing that going to see a movie, etc.

I can see the reasoning, but I never completely bought it, because most recreational players would probably rather be playing with other recs of equal ability, which would lead to them losing their money slower. However, without any pro or semi-pro players there may be less chance for a game to actually be going which the rec wants to play, which is an argument in favor of this reasoning.

I previously was in the market research industry / political polling field. I honestly didn't feel I contributed anymore to society in that job. I think almost all money spent on advertising and market research is a total waste and just leads to higher costs for consumers. And I think political polling is probably a net negative for the political system.

Bernie Sanders is a drain on society.

Meh, if I can make a living doing something I enjoy, that's enough for me.

Fwiw my attorney's mistress strongly objects to that statement

This kind of Keynesian analysis treats savings like someone stuffing their net worth under a mattress and assumes that the $100 saved doesn't end up being spent elsewhere (like putting the $ in reserves so that a bank can finance a loan for a business).

No I don't think it's unethical to win money at poker. Nor do I even think it's a "drain", as people are free to spend their $ how they wish. However, as a winning poker professional, you're in the entertainment business, just like actors/actresses, talent agents, street performers, strippers, and what have you. Since logical extremes are the best way to communicate points, we'll take one and say that if the entire world decided overnight to take up career paths in entertainment, that we'd regress hundreds of years in no time. So clearly not all "money movement" is the same.

Plus, to say that the person who saves religiously is somehow a drain to the economy (or at the very least, that the person who spends frivolously is better for it) is dangerous. Really, assuming economic productivity comes from consumption and not production is dangerous.

Yes and no.
I mean, every rec players should expect to lose when they go into a casino, regardless of the game they play.
In fact, they have probably a greater chance to win in limit poker than in any other games casino provides imo.

Are slot machines and cigs a drain on the economy?

Well this thread devolved pretty rapidly.

Don't worry, the moral police will sort this all out, and tell us what's moral, and productive

Good points, and I generally agree. But I'm also a UChicago economist*, so go Keynes!

*economist-in-training who has worked at UChicago, so bit of a stretch to call myself this, but decided an asterisk would offset the false bragging :P

People who complain about other people being a drain on society should really take a critical look at their own lives.

What do people do, really, that they think is so damn important? Curing cancer so people can die some other way, possibly by heart attack from the stress of being broke from cancer treatments? Deep frying fatty foods for lazy people? Programming an app that allows you to share your awesome unfiltered thoughts with the entire world? Welding pieces of metal together so people can moce turnips from one part of the world to another?

The goal of employment is to provide something to someone. It really doesn't matter if that thing is medicine or laughter or legal advice or blowjobs. If you want to take a dim view of anyone's profession you should be consistent across all professions.

Poker players provide entertainment and escape from reality, just like singers or Hibachi chefs or Fox News.

Well, not ALL lawyers, just the ones who act like politicians and seek to govern other people.

Really, the only way someone is a drain on society, is if by removing them, the society would improve.

Rather than use this time as a launching point to attack people I don't like, let's say we can reasonably conclude that poker players aren't in this category. Society is not worse off because they exist. For example, if crime stopped tomorrow, the world would be better off. However, if poker stopped tomorrow, it'd be a neutral thing.

At worst, poker pros are non-contributors.
Calling them a drain on society is a huge stretch.
Unless they're also criminals.

I don't think poker players are non-contributors and therefore don't think they're a drain on society, but I also think if someone is a non-contributor, they are a drain on society, because they benefit from other people's contributions without contributing themselves. If they all vanished, society wouldn't have to take care of these non-contributors. It seems a bit overboard to insist that in order for someone to be a "drain," they must be net negative contribution, unless by non-contributor, you're saying contribution and drain are measured on the same scale, in which case you're statement is tautologically correct (but I don't like it ).

Well in that case children and old people that can't work anymore are all a drain to society ...
Ps: society ain't just about money imo ...poor americains lol

I consider someone a "drain" if they actively make society worse. People who commit crimes or game government programs would be examples of this.

Pro poker players aren't providing a product or service (besides "entertainment" which could easily be provided by a worse player) but they aren't removing anything from society either.

One good thing that they do, imo, is take money that would normally go to the casino (either by recs playing on equal footing and dropping everything down the rake hole, or by playing casino games and losing directly to the house) and pump that cash into varying industries.

And I say they're non-contributors at worst because your contributions to society can't be purely defined by your profession.

Agreed! How nice it is when a 2p2 debate ends in agreement!

Children have an expected benefit to society in the future, so they're definitely not a drain, although it seems unfair to say children aren't a drain since they have a future expected benefit but also say that saving cash doesn't contribute to the economy since it too has a future expected benefit. As for old people, well, yeah they don't do much, do they?

I do think that the role of compulsive gambling with respect to profits is something that poker pros need to come to some grips with.

I mean, how do you all feel about tobacco and booze companies, or drug dealers?

Again, this doesn't mean that poker pros are horrible people-- I don't think they are-- but, really, assuming that it's just like any other job does ignore some key differences.

I think pharmaceutical companies vs drug dealers is a good thing to think about when you're considering the question of your own value to society.

Cocaine and heroin both have medicinal uses and were legally marketed pharmaceuticals in the past, for instance.

But let's take cancer therapy as something generally considered good. What exactly is the value of 5 years of progression free survival, and if a pharmaceutical company were to cure some type of deadly cancer but charge a 75-year old a million dollars, are they a net plus or net drain on society?