--- title: The Richest Americans Drop $25,000 a Year on Gambling description: 'Over a quarter of the wealthiest Americans spent over $25,000 on gambling in the past year. Other big spending: sports, jewelry & travel.' authors: - name: Megan Leonhardt url: https://money.com/author/megan-leonhardt/ at_money_since: 2016 articles: 204 covers: - Lifestyle - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Economy and Politics - Education - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Investing - Loans - Personal Finance - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology social: - https://x.com/Megan_Leonhardt former_staff: true published: '2016-11-29T18:32:29.000Z' modified: '2016-11-29T18:32:29.000Z' section: Lifestyle tags: - gambling - Spending - super rich - ultra high net worth - wealthy word_count: 290 canonical: https://money.com/the-rich-gamble-a-lot/ type: Article source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![Woman throwing dice at craps table in casino, friends watching](https://img.money.com/2016/11/gettyimages-72983311.jpg) The rich are indeed different from you and me: A big chunk of them drop half of what you might earn each year on gambling alone. Over a quarter of the wealthiest Americans spent over $25,000 on gambling over the past year -- roughly half of the estimated $55,775 average household income in the U.S. in 2015, according to the [Census ACS survey](http://www.deptofnumbers.com/income/us/). An additional 15% of these ultra wealthy elites -- those with fortunes of at least $25 million -- spent at least $10,000, according to a [new report](http://spectrem.com/Content_Whitepaper/spending-habits-of-wealthiest-americans.aspx) from research firm Spectrum Group. How does that compare to the average Joe? According to the [Las Vegas Convention And Visitors Authority](http://www.lvcva.com/includes/content/images/media/docs/2015-Las-Vegas-Visitor-Profile.pdf), people who visit the desert gambling mecca -- an admittedly self-selecting group -- bet just under $600 per visit, and average just under two trips a year. Of course, the richest Americans drop thousands of dollars on other forms of entertainment as well. About 40% spend at least $10,000 a year on sports tickets and season passes, the report finds, and about 8% spent the same amount on the arts, purchasing tickets to plays, symphonies, and museums. And then there's what they wear. One in four of the ultra rich spend over $50,000 on clothes annually, and over a third bought $25,000 or more in jewelry last year. But by far, the super wealthy spent the most on travel and vacations last year. Almost half spent at least $10,000 on travel, while about 8% splurged and paid more than $100,000 for vacations. That makes sense: Spending on experiences has been shown to [generate more happiness](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/10/buy-experiences/381132/) than purchasing material goods, so travel spending is a great way for the ultra rich to get the best return on their investment. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/the-rich-gamble-a-lot/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Lifestyle", "item": "https://money.com/lifestyle/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Places to Travel", "item": "https://money.com/places-to-travel/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "The Richest Americans Drop $25,000 a Year on Gambling" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/the-rich-gamble-a-lot/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/the-rich-gamble-a-lot/", "name": "The Richest Americans Drop $25,000 a Year on Gambling", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2016-11-29T18:32:29.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/the-rich-gamble-a-lot/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/the-rich-gamble-a-lot/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2016-11-29T18:32:29.000Z" }, { "@type": "Article", "headline": "The Richest Americans Drop $25,000 a Year on Gambling", "articleSection": "Lifestyle", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2016/11/gettyimages-72983311.jpg", "width": 4918, "height": 3691, "caption": "Gambling" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Megan Leonhardt", "url": "https://money.com/author/megan-leonhardt/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/megan-leonhardt/#author", "email": "megan.leonhardt@moneymail.com", "sameAs": [ "https://x.com/Megan_Leonhardt" ] } ], "publisher": "https://money.com/#organization", "datePublished": "2016-11-29T18:32:29.000Z", "description": "Over a quarter of the wealthiest Americans spent over $25,000 on gambling in the past year. 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