Why Most Gamblers Go Broke: Insights from a Python Simulation

On Zhihu a question arose: if each gamble has a 50% win rate, why do many end up bankrupt? We built a Python simulation to explore.

Experiment Design

Gambling method: dice high/low, one round per day, stops when gambler loses all money or the casino closes.

After three consecutive losses, the gambler increases the bet by 50%.

The gambler starts with 1,000,000 RMB, bringing 20,000 RMB to the first session.

If the bankroll is depleted, the gambler borrows a high‑interest loan (estimated 5% monthly) and repays it the next day.

Loan repayment is immediate, modeling a “disciplined” gambler.

Simulation Steps

We created characters and a betting function (code omitted for brevity). Each gambler played 100 rounds per day, recording daily profit or loss.

Results

Out of 1,000 simulated gamblers, 833 went bankrupt, yielding an 83.3% bankruptcy rate. The remaining 167 survived, with 3 still at a loss and 164 making a profit. The most successful earned 12.5 million RMB; only six participants exceeded ten million.

Considering an estimated 13% annual inflation over eight years, the nominal 12.5 million profit corresponds to about 5.53 million in today’s purchasing power.

Conclusion

Simulation shows a high bankruptcy rate (83.3%) with half of the gamblers going broke within a year.

Gambling yields low profit margins; it is not a viable path to wealth.

Beating the casino is practically impossible.