CAI

Consumer Awareness Institute

Non-profit Corporation

Gambling a safer bet than MLM/network marketing

 It has been assumed by many that MLM or network marketing was a harmless home business. But careful analyses of company reports and mandated disclosures tell a different story. Product-based pyramid schemes have a much higher loss rate than naked, no-product pyramid schemes. And gambling looks like a safe bet in comparison with leading MLM programs. For example:

The odds of winning from a single spin of the wheel in a game of roulette in Las Vegas* is –

• 286 times as great as the odds of profiting from enrolling in Amway (Quixtar)
• 143 times as great as the odds of profiting from enrolling in Nikken
• 48 times as great as the odds of profiting from enrolling in Nu Skin
• 36 times as great as the odds of profiting from enrolling in Arbonne
• 29 times as great as the odds of profiting from enrolling in Reliv
• 22 times as great as the odds of profiting from enrolling in Melaleuca

 For a more complete breakdown and comparison between the odds of success for gambling, as compared with no-product pyramid schemes and with gambling, read the chart “Which Does the Greater Harm?” (10 MLM programs) linked from the MLM Numbers page at – http://www.mlm-thetruth.com/statistics.htm

  Other ways in which MLM or network marketing is worse than gambling include:

• Gambling is tightly regulated, while MLM is not.
• Gambling is honest. When one gambles at a casino, a person knows he or she is gambling and that the odds are slim. With MLM, the promise of “residual income” bears no resemblance to the reality of almost certain loss. If one counts required purchases of products as a cost of “playing the game,” approximately 99.9% lose money.
• Most games of chance are of brief duration. Serious MLM participants may spend all their spare time for years on a treadmill of promotional activity, endeavoring to recoup their investment and hoping in vain to earn the promised rewards.
• Recruiting MLM’s constitute is an endless chain of recruitment and thereby can act like a fast-growing cancer, with each recruit beholden to recruit at least ten people to earn enough in commissions to recoup his/her investment in products and services. Compulsive gambling, on the other hand, does not incentivize the recruitment of other gamblers.

CONCLUSION: The worst pyramid schemes are product-based – or recruiting MLM’s, such as the six listed above.  One can do better in ’Vegas. (not that we are promoting gambling)

 * Based in statistics furnished by Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas

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