If a gambler and the casino keep going forever, how come the casino is always the winner?
In: Mathematics
Intuitively, the house has to always win, otherwise it fails as a business. A business is there to make money – if the house always loses then it has to keep paying out and eventually goes bankrupt.
As for how the house always wins, it depends on the game. For example, roulette you can bet on black or red, but even if you place even bets on both, there’s also the green space(s) the ball can land on, so there’s always a chance that you lose on both bets.
Blackjack is one game where the house edge is very small, typically less than 1% using basic strategy. This has infamously led to things like the MIT card counting team which employed several strategies including card counting and team play to swing the odds to the player’s favor.
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