There are "pari-mutual" betting systems, for instance the system used for horse racing in New York State, which are very market-like by design. Instead of an oddsmaker as in the European or Vegas systems, the odds on a particular outcome (e.g. a particular horse to win/place/show) are determined by market activity: the weight of bets on that horse vs. others in that race.

http://thefinalwager.co/2015/04/28/horse-racing-parimutuel-w...

If you are honestly better at judging the ability of particular horses and jockeys to win races than the average market participant, it is possible (at least in theory, I don't know how many people do it in practice) to make money.

However, the house "takeout" is pretty high; most places are 15+% on straight bets and can be more than 20% on exotic bets (Exactas, Quinellas, etc.). If not for the high takeout, it would be a very nice system for the bettor.

The only time I've ever made money at a horse track was a time when I went with a friend who rode and owned horses, and we spent the entire day in the paddock area (not even watching the races), watching the horses and jockeys come in. She pointed out particular instances where she thought the favorite didn't seem likely to win, and in those cases I'd put down straight bets on the next-best favorite horses, essentially "shorting" the favorite. It worked pretty well, enough to get around the house takeout and almost offset the drinks we consumed in the process. Not exactly something you'd want in your 401k, but not a bad way to spend an afternoon.

Blackjack, a casino game with unusually good odds, has a house edge of 0.43%

You can certainly get brokers that'll accept a lower commission than that per trade, and if you're not hugely overleveraged the variance of your expected returns is going to be lower[1]. As with poker, the difficulty isn't so much the house edge as the fact there will be people or bots who are much better at it than you and/or have much bigger bankrolls to force you out of the market even if your suspicion they're holding a weak hand is justified

[1]Your expected returns are also on average positive in the long term if you buy and hold rather than trading

But does the broker give you free Pina Coladas?

>is it gambling with the best odds around?

You can expect, on average, to perform as well as the market, less your trading fees (which for most of us small-timers are ~$10 per round trip).

The problem is not knowing the odds (and hence expected earnings) ex-ante. That said, horse racing would probably be the best analogy.

I would say the stock market more represents a poker game with hundreds of thousands of participants. There is no house, it's a free for all, and day traders simply don't have the capital or manpower to survive.

In poker there is a dealer: you are expected to tip the dealer if you win. In the stock market you pay the dealer win or lose.

In poker you pay the rake, win or lose.

Depends on the rake system, in timed games this is the case but more common they take it from the pot so only the winner pays. But typically you win some pots even in a losing session so it's a pedantic point.