The lottery is a tax on people with poor judgement skills and I'm not comfortable with the state taking direct advantage of its vulnerable citizens.
Not everyone impoverished by state sanctioned gambling would do so in an illegal only world. You can bicker about what the conversion ratio is but the fact of the matter is that it exists. And no, I don't know what it is.
Eventually you'll have no lawbreakers. Either because everyone's dead, or because everyone knows they'll be killed if they break the law.
Either way, you end up with a crimeless society.
Hopefully you can see the problem with "taking things to their logical conclusion."
State lotteries don't represent "state-run crime" but rather transform existing underground markets into legal, regulated alternatives. Illegal gambling operations have long existed, typically run by criminal organizations offering no consumer protections or public benefits. State lotteries provide transparency and channel revenue toward public services instead of organized crime.
Following your reasoning would suggest that legalizing and regulating alcohol or cannabis equates to "state burglary" or "state fraud" — clearly an absurd comparison. The objective isn't to convert crimes into government enterprises, but to acknowledge when prohibition is ineffective and provide a safer, regulated alternative.
I myself have never understood the thrill payoff that must exist for lottery ticket buyers, but I cannot call it a tax.
My complaint is about the targeted nature of lotteries and the extremely poor investments they make for individuals who tend to already struggle in this area. This is compounded by the nature of the education system being operated primary by the same government.
I was referring to the ‘numbers game’ racket: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_game
No - the reason they do is because they can and it rakes in tons of money. Period.
If it were legal normal business would do it, see for example weed or booze before and after prohibition.
This isn't really a concept that makes sense. Organized crime is a state. They serve the same functions, care about the same things, and draw legitimacy from the same sources.
The thrill is being able to dream for a week about what you'd do with the winnings.
For the vast majority of "the poor" who buy a ticket, that's what they're buying.
There are also a few who spend all their money they might have on lottery tickets, but those aren't much of the total number of people.
Is there any evidence of that? I can recall reading that alcohol consumption, for example, has a Pareto distribution skewing in favor of so-called "heavy users" (whom most of us would refer to as alcoholics). I'd imagine a lot of vice industries are similar. Is there any evidence to suggest lottery ticket purchases are distributed across a large number of infrequent, low-volume purchasers?
The company (and most lotto companies would be the same I'd guess) had little interest in taking money from problem gamblers too because in most cases their business is a monopoly so they're making good money anyway, and enabling problem gamblers would almost certainly be a breach of their license, so they'd be up for big fines (or in an extremely unlikely scenario, loss of their license). Contrast that with horse and sports betting companies where there's lots of competition and slim margins, so if you want to make money you need to take a bit from the problem gamblers.
That said, it probably is a Pareto distribution, but skewed: maybe 95% low/normal spenders, 4% syndicates/big spenders with means, 1% problem gamblers.
Most of the people who are addicted want a quick hit, and so end up at a casino.
I get the same thrill because I dream of finding the winning ticket on a sidewalk. Much cheaper, and the walk is good for me.
Exactly. and as bad as the odds are, it's still the best chance they have to ever be rich.
I don't get the winning thrill either, but several gambling addicts I used to work with described it as a feeling like none other. When I offered to go with them, as support to get help, they weren't interested in that feeling.
Remember how Pluto stopped being a planet because 'planet' went from just a word to a technical term with a well defined definition? Most words don't have that.
So, tax is any money given to the government. Income tax, sales tax, fees for registering cars, admittance to national parks, etc etc. Anytime the government collects any money that is a tax.
To paraphrase a great statesman---a lottery is just a tax with extra steps.
Maybe it's just fun and exciting. Do people who bet in casinos or on sports have poor judgement skills or is it just exciting?
But clearly the gambling industries are predicated on quite a lot of volume going to negative expected value purchases which sounds depressing rather than exciting.
better than leaving it to the criminal underworld, though.
My understanding is that the proliferation of casinos, state lotteries, etc. has been very bad for organized crime's traditional business model.
State lotteries pay out ~60% on average, compared to ~90%+ for casinos. Not apples to apples, but it seems like competition does shrink profit margins, for the benefit of the buyer. It's not clear to me which is better, but I'd be curious to read good analyses, if anyone has a pointer.
In this case, texas voters can demand the changes to prevent some company from buying all the numbers again. A private entity wouldn't be accountable to the public for anything. We have countless examples of private companies screwing over people both in secret or openly no matter how much the public wishes that they would stop.
I’ve not seen it applied to the lottery specifically but you might even be able to use the Kelly Criterion to determine how much you can lose.