A Critique of Lottery Critics
(from the speech Take the High Road and Keep the Upper Hand)

By
Edward J. Stanek, Ph.D.
President of the North American Association of
State and Provincial Lotteries

Delivered to NASPL
At its Twenty-Third Annual Meeting
Boston, Massachusetts
September 29, 1997
©1997 Iowa Lottery

A Critique of Lottery Critics
With the appointment in the U.S. of the new National Gambling Impact Study Commission, there may be much more attention focused on lotteries than would normally be expected. The Commission is charged with preparing a report for Congress. There should be considerable skepticism over its objectivity not because its task is unreasonable, but because of the prejudice built into the Commission. It is not balanced from a lottery viewpoint and, in fact, it could be as much askew against lotteries as is possible under the legislation that created it. Three of the nine members are anti-gaming. Another member opposed the creation of the California Lottery.  Three members have ties to the casino industry, which competes with the lottery industry.  One is a former public official from New Jersey, where casinos have a much influence, and only one so far appears to be neutral on lotteries.

Will the casino interests team up to create a sham of study—a misdirection of attention to lotteries as the strawman to accept a whipping while they blind their eyes to their own problems? There were early untrue statements that seemed to suggest such would be the case.¹  The journalists in this country need to be vigilant lest they be fooled by loaded dice and a stacked deck.

Unfortunately, in the course of the last year, there have been many examples of print and television journalism that smacked to the "yellow press."  Some respected publishers and producers regressed to tabloid ethics in doing editorials against lotteries that they called "news" or "documentaries" – incorporating ignorance and bias to sell their wares through sensationalism and distortions.  As disgusting as the behavior of the paparazzi is, the pictures they sell are real-world images. The pen and paper paparazzi can paint pictures that aren’t representative of the real world and sell them just the same.  Anecdotes, hyperbole, and fiction make good entertainment, but are not sound bases for public policy making.

The cornerstone of the lottery business is honesty. It is particularly distressing for those of us in the lottery business who try to practice this virtue to be attacked by those less virtuous from institutions that profess to be the public conscience. Most journalists are honest and hardworking. For example, National Public Radio's recent feature of lottery opponent Robyn Gearey and lottery proponent David Gale on its "Talk of the Nation" program was balanced. However, there is no licensing or review board to ferret out prejudice, incompetence, bias and malintent on the part of the media as there is with virtually every other respected profession. Some of the media seem to take an attitude best described by Mark Twain: "I like the truth sometimes, but I don’t care enough for it to hanker after it."

Obviously, most journalists do care for the truth, but their perspective may not be representative of the public as a whole. According to the Prothman-Lichter study done in 1979 and 1980, 95% of leading journalists are white, 60 percent are male, and 50 percent profess no religion at all. According to Understanding the Press, in the 1972 general election, 61 percent of the American electorate voted for one presidential candidate, and 81 percent of the media voted for the other. Such a difference could imply that journalists as a group are leaders among the public or it could imply that they "lead " the public – an act devoid of the objectivity that the public expects and journalists profess. As a group, journalists have difficulty relating to business and that lack of understanding leads to slanted reporting. Lotteries are a unique hybrid of business and government in which even veterans can get confused. The tenets of good business remain unflinching while the perspectives of good government sway with the party in power and the public mood.

Lotteries don’t take advantage of the poor.
Poor people are allowed to vote, get married, and sign contracts. Society in the U.S. and Canada does not usurp rights and privileges based on socioeconomic status. Why then, do those less prosperous needs to be protected from making a one-dollar decision?

Being born is a lottery. No one had the ability to establish the qualifications for his or her parents. No one examined the pool of available genes and chromosomes and selectively chose he or her own physical, emotional, and intellectual characteristics. Therefore, through no accomplishment of our own, all of us have unique attributes that are lacking in others. It is true that work is an essential element to create success, but most of us, no matter how hard we try, will never have the looks of a supermodel, the voice of an opera singer, be the high scorer in the NBA or derive the general theory of relativity. Why? The luck of the draw! That same luck governs who has a name like Kennedy or Rockefeller and is a millionaire at birth. Big jackpot games are equalizers. Those who were not fortunate in the drawing of genes and inheritance can venture a chance equal to everyone else to benefit financially. No promises-just a chance. Just like life.

There are those zealots who want to deprive others of a chance to prosper – because they think they know what’s best for others. Despite the pretense, they don’t.

Lotteries don’t discriminate among their customers. They sell to tall, short, rich and poor. If there is something inherently wrong with allowing less prosperous people the choice to buy a ticket, then the protectionists should seek legislation to prohibit low-income citizens from taking a chance. Why haven’t they? Because the folly of their self-righteous protectionism would be exposed.

For a lottery to take "advantage" of the poor would imply that the poor have a "disadvantage." Obviously they have less money, which means that lotteries can benefit them more relative to helping those of greater means. The only way that the poor can be at a disadvantage is if they don’t have the same mental capacity to make $1 decisions as those who are wealthier. It follows that those who make such claims are assuming that the poor have a diminished intellectual capacity. But economic status is not a measure of intelligence. Saying that the poor are taken advantage of in this context is an insult to the intelligence of those who play lottery games.

It has been alleged that lower-income people spend a higher percentage of their income on lottery products. Obviously such is true for any product with a fixed price, whether it is bread, clothing, shampoo or a movie ticket. Whatever price is chosen for a product, divide it by a lower income and you get a higher percentage. If this issue were really socially significant, government could issue gaming stamps like food stamps to low income customers and give a discount on tickets that would negate the issue…but it would not negate the critics. Obviously, a person making $10,000 a year will spend a higher percentage of his or her salary on a $1 ticket than a person making $100,000 per year. That fact, however, does not support the hypothesis that low-income persons are lottery customers or that they are targets of marketing campaigns. The logic is faulty and numerous studies have concluded that middle-income persons are the lottery’s principal customers.²

In certain instances where "daily numbers" games are sold in large metropolitan areas from St. Louis east, there exists a cultural anomaly where lower-income blue-collar workers play the game in distinctly higher proportions that their white-collar counterparts. Data will show that this particular game has a lower-income following. The game was sold by organized crime for generations. Government lotteries in Washington D.C., Boston, Baltimore, New York, and elsewhere took almost all of that business away from organized crime. Proving that this phenomenon is a cultural rather than an economic bias is the fact that the same game, sold by lotteries to the same economic demographic west of St. Louis, has resulted in relative consumer rejection and virtual failure. Cities west of St. Louis developed into urban areas later and were devoid of the criminal numbers running tradition. The game is a cultural preference.

If lotteries were to remove this game with such significant demand from eastern metropolitan areas, organized crime would again fill the void. Since experiments with prohibition have failed, government has but one choice – sell the game and capture the profits or let crime bosses have the income.

Lotteries do have more retail outlets in lower-income neighborhoods.
Why? Lotteries don’t discriminate on income but do try to service their customers. More $75,000 homes can fit into a square mile than $500,000 estates can fit into the same space. More one-bedroom apartments can fit into a square mile than $125,000 houses can fit in the same space. With more homes there are more people. If lotteries don’t discriminate based on income, they must have more outlets where there are more people in order provide equal service.

How about those studies that have shown more lottery outlets per capita in poorer neighborhoods in some states? I live in a neighborhood called "South of Grand" in Des Moines. It’s an old established neighborhood where the wealthiest lawyers, doctors and business people live. Despite the large size of the neighborhood, there are no lottery outlets there – not one. There are no stores in "South of Grand." Zoning doesn’t allow stores. When doctors and lawyers who live South of Grand want to buy a lottery ticket, they have to go to a less prosperous neighborhood – not for reasons of social consequence, but because they can only shop in a neighborhood with stores. Yes, it is true that there is more lottery outlets in neighborhoods that have more stores.

In some cases the stores are located in industrial or commercial areas which have a very large middle class population of workers by day who buy their tickets while the sun shines and leave the neighborhood to a different demographic group, the census takers, and tabloid journalists by night.

Lotteries don’t target advertising to the poor.
It would be both a bad business decision and a bad political decision. It would be bad business, because attracting customers with less money doesn’t add to the bottom line. It would be bad politics because lotteries are public entities. There was a billboard in one neighborhood cited over and over last year as alleged proof of targeting the underprivileged.³  That particular billboard was one in a campaign involving hundreds of billboards in every class of neighborhood. There was no targeting. Even so, it was one billboard over ten years ago and another billboard example in any state or province out of thousands of possibilities has been cited as corroboration.

Why do lotteries advertise? Because players have a right to know the rules, what the prizes are, where to buy tickets, and other information? State lotteries are public, not secret enterprises. The advertising money does not come from taxpayers-it comes from lottery players. So it is the players, the customers, the people who earned their money and the right to spend it, that should have the loudest voice in determining advertising policy. The next loudest voice should be given to retailers- they provide a service to the state for a low commission, and all the products that they sell deserve support from the companies that provide the products. Why should lotteries shortchange retailers with inadequate advertising support? Yet some policy makers keep trying to arrange it. If the public were asked which ads are more honest and more essential, most lottery ads or most political campaign ads-what do you think would be the answer.

Lottery advertising should be regulated by the Federal Trade Commission. 
I received 26 direct mail pieces from private sweepstakes companies in the course of a few weeks. Many of them made outrageous proclamations that assured me that I was the winner of millions of dollars when I wasn’t. Some said that all I needed to do was fill in the forms and follow instructions to claim the prize. The instructions are cumbersome and lead the respondent to decide on making a purchase several times along the way to completion. In one multimillion-dollar giveaway in which I was a definite winner, I claimed the unspecified prize and received a packet of seeds several weeks later.

These mailings come in envelopes that look like they contain legal documents or express delivery to feign importance – but they are usually sent bulk rate. No North American lottery would tolerate the misleading marketing used by these companies. Yet all of the companies sending these notices are regulated by the Federal Trade Commission. So much for the FTC’s ability to keep advertising forthright. It’s a good thing that government lotteries hold themselves to a higher advertising standard than is required of the private sweepstakes companies.

Lotteries don’t advertise the odds of winning all prizes in all ads.
It’s hard to get every message into a 30-second TV spot.  But all lotteries make all of those odds available in print just like food companies list their ingredients. Except for the famous "two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun" ad, I don’t know of any food company that uses TV to list every ingredient.

Do lotteries foster the notion of something for nothing? 
Inheritance, interest on idle cash, capital gain – they are all financial gain for no work. The first due to luck and the other two the result of risk-taking usury, which until the 20^th century meant charging any amount of interest on a loan. In the Bible, usury is a sin. "…thou hast taken usury and increase and thou hast greedily gained of thy neighbors by extortion, and forgotten me, saith the Lord God." Eze 22:12. "If thou lend money to any of my people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to his as a usurer, neither shall thou lay upon him usury." Exd 22:25. And there is more about this subject in the Good Book.⁴  Shakespeare said, "Neither a Borrower nor a Lender be." Why? Because charging interest is the wealthy who have money-taking advantage of the poor who don’t. How many bankers do you see lined up at confessionals after work every day? Banks in the U.S. made over $59 billion last year by charging interest loans of other people’s idle money. Lotteries made $11.8 billion. Yet the principles of banking are seldom the target of tabloid journalism.

Should we spend money to take a chance?
Think carefully about insurance companies. They sell chances. State lotteries would prefer that their customers think something good might happen to them if they buy lottery products. Insurance companies count on customers thinking something bad might happen to them so that they feel compelled to buy insurance products. Lotteries use optimism to make a sale. Insurance companies use fear to make a sale. Both count on statistics and take calculated risks to make profit. Last year in the U.S. insurance companies made $39.9 billion for themselves. Lotteries made $11.8 billion for the public good.

Banks and insurance companies play valuable roles in today’s society. Despite their dependence on risk, usury, and fear, they should be tolerated – and so should lotteries. Lotteries don’t depend on usury and fear. Besides, with lotteries the risk is much lower and players don’t have to be rich to participate.

History has documented relatively few people who have risked so much on lotteries that they lost house and home. History has documented relatively many people who have risked so much on the stock market, commodities, and farming that they did lose house and home. There is only one medicine to prevent these afflictions. It’s called moderation. Obviously the risk on lottery tickets is lower than the risk on most other gambles, even though the potential reward with the lottery could be higher. Still, moderation in all things – "play with your head not over your head." Don’t bet the farm and don’t buy lottery tickets on credit, even though credit is commonly used when gambling on stocks and pork bellies (margin).

Lotteries have a positive impact on the economy.
Some economists have asserted that the money wagered on lotteries is taken out of the economy and isn’t used for goods and services that support employment or meaningful activity. Their analysis is shallow. Money spent on lottery tickets gets parceled several ways:

• Commissions to retailers
• Fees to companies for services
• Advertising
• Satellite uplinks, television studios, rents, vehicle fleets, accounting firms, data processing, drawing machined, ticket printers. Lottery revenues are channeled into the economy the same as the revenues of an average business.
• There are profits that go to the government. Those profits take the place of higher taxes and are used to deliver goods and services like other money circulating through the economy.
• What’s left? Only prize money. It does get redistributed to those who win from those who don’t. Those who don’t win can’t buy chocolate bars, gum, or rent movies but the winners can buy toasters, scholarships, new cars, and houses, or start their own businesses. So the real economic drawback must be the really big winner who can’t spend money fast enough and must stuff it into a mattress or keep it in the basement, where it does no one any good. I do know of those big winners who have spent money on lawyers and accountants. I know that some idle winnings go into the bank or into a brokerage account - economists must say that’s okay. Where are the overstuffed mattresses?

Lotteries are not an expenditure of money lacking a useful purpose.  Lotteries are entertainment – a little bit of fun for a small prize or a fantasy about a big prize. Each ticket costs about a dollar. Have the same critics thought about expenditures on spectator sports? Sports in general are fabulous creations. Those who participate in them learn teamwork, self-discipline, and other social skills. They get stronger, faster, or at least minimally keep their bodies in shape. But as a spectator, not one of these benefits accrues to the ticket buyer. Fun – yes. Entertainment – yes. Even some hope. But real value – no.

What do those sports tickets cost? It depends on whether the event is collegiate or professional -$15 to $75 or maybe even $2,200 if it’s the Super Bowl. How about the two-minute prize fight that took a small bite out of the boxer’s ear and a big bite out of spectators’ wallets! It should be difficult to rationalize taking $75 from the poor and giving it to the rich (pro athletes and owners) especially when taxpayers are asked to use tax dollars to build the stadiums where the rich get richer. (Tax dollars are not used to build lotteries.) With the lottery, for one buck if a player wishes, he or she can fantasize for a day or two, as opposed to being entertained for an hour or two by a sporting event. Lottery tickets on average return over 50% of the price to the players. Not so with pro sports – when the money’s spent there’s no hope of ever getting any of it back.

How about movies or television? Admittedly there are some educational productions that leave the public a little wiser. But do most movie theaters, cassette rentals, or TV shows really enrich human lives, make people smarter or stronger? How about Hollywood’s reliance on a preponderance of sex and violence? State lotteries don’t rely on sex and violence to make a sale. Lottery tickets contain no tars or nicotine, no caffeine, sodium, calories, cholesterol, saturated fats, carcinogens, preservatives, or alcohol. They don’t impair driving, cause cancer, or clog arteries. As an entertainment mechanism with no poisons, they should be more socially acceptable that television, spectator sports, or a quarter-pounder with cheese.

Lottery tickets can be addictive.
The degree of addiction is different for various games. Video lottery problems, although confined to only a few states, are the most pronounced. The problems must be acknowledged. The lottery industry must support treatment and keeping the problems in perspective. Every human being that frequents heroin will become an addict. Between 2% and 4% of the general population has a propensity to become compulsive gamblers. Some new research suggests that compulsive behavior is the result of a chemical or biological problem that manifests itself by excessive gambling, drinking, drug use, sex, fanatical religion, or something else, implying that gambling itself is not the problem. More conventional thinking suggests that if lottery tickets are the only available gambling product, 20% to 40% of the 4% with a propensity for problem gambling could become lottery addicts. But cards, sports betting (legal or illegal) and commodity markets are available everywhere. In a state like Iowa, where other forms of gaming are available, there are good statistics on the contributions of the lottery to problem gambling. Last year nearly 3,700 urgent calls were placed to the Iowa Department of Public Health on the Gambling Treatment Helping. It’s an 800-toll free number. It is printed on every Iowa lottery ticket, lottery terminal, lottery vending machine, play station and brochure. It does not appear on every slot machine or blackjack table – although it can be found on a poster somewhere in a 50,000 square foot casino. Last year 6% of all the calls on these lines were from people who had played lottery games. That means that 94 % of the callers did not have a problem with lottery games. Also remember that the 6% who did account for 0.12% of the adult population. There is a credo that dictates even one problem is too many. But is it fair to restrict the activities of 99.7% of the adult population to shield the other 0.3%? Since the leading cause of death other than by disease is vehicle accidents, should cars, trucks, and buses be outlawed? Lottery tickets don't cause death! Restrictions may need to be enacted to protect people from other people. Assistance should be provided to people who may otherwise hurt themselves – but there should be moderation in protectionism lest the living be buried in a coffin of fear and overreaction.

Lotteries must be proponents for problem gambling treatment and for reform of the methods used to diagnose it.
The South Oaks Gambling Screen, the best detection tool so far developed, has been shown to diagnose more false positives than true positives. In New Zealand, it classified non-pathological gamblers. It has classified 64.6% of sports card collectors as probable pathological gamblers. Using current methods of data tabulation is eternal. Rates can only increase – never decrease for a given population – not because of measured problems, but "by definition." Using a screwdriver because it is the only tool available to pound a nail does not justify its use. Relying on aspirin because it is the only medicine available as a cure for cancer is false pretense. The old diagnostics provide consistency only for its own sake and have become the hobgoblins of small and large minds alike. It is time to develop new tools that work, rather than waste time using old tools that don’t work.

Compulsive gamblers and white-collar crime.
In January of 1997 The Economist ventured that "American Insurance Institute estimates that 40% of white collar crime has its roots in gambling." Congressman, professors, authors and the "Harvard Mental Health Letter" have all used the conclusion from the American Insurance Institute. However, there is no American Insurance Institute or any study documenting the above conclusion. It’s a hoax. After exhaustively using all of the directories, contacts, and computer tools available, the Institute cannot be found and those who have quoted its conclusions cannot find it or produce the study either. Joseph M. Kelly has published a detailed treatise in the Gambling Law Review (Volume 1, Number 2, 1997) documenting the unwitting use of this farce by prestigious persons and institutions.

Lotteries are not self-regulating.
Earlier this year, I read that other forms of gaming shouldn’t pose much work for the national commission because they are highly regulated, but state lotteries are not subject to such scrutiny. All Lottery board meetings are public meetings. Lottery files are public records. What companies must produce for the press any record requested – only lotteries and the U.S. Postal Service that I know of. Each legislative session, with few exceptions, each state lottery is subjected to legislative scrutiny both for budgets and for operations. Detractors have the power of examine the minutest lottery details, voicing opinions, and voting on the lottery’s business operations. Which other gaming enterprises present their operations to a group of detractors for approval and open their files for the press? Which other businesses give a vote on their operations to those opposed to their existence? The regulation in Nevada and Atlantic City doesn’t even come close.

During this past year, a question has been posed in many different forums. "For generations we were taught that gambling was evil. Now the government is promoting it.   If it was wrong before, isn’t it wrong now and how can the government be so immoral?"  Morality can’t be legislated but governments try to do it all of the time.

Our ideas on right and wrong come from religious roots and social norms, which vary from culture to culture and time to time. Religion is not a topic in these treaties. However, rightness and wrongness as a matter of law or social acceptability offer some insights. Something should not be labeled right or wrong just because it is so labeled at another place or time. In Afghanistan today, sanctions are applied to men who trim their beards and women who don’t cover their faces or who seek education or employment. In America’s past, women were burned alive if suspected of witchcraft. Dancing was forbidden. Galileo was excommunicated from the Church because he would not accept that the sun revolves around the earth, which was believed to be the center of the universe. It was illegal to own gold bullion in the U.S. from 1934 until 1971. It was illegal for women to vote in the U.S. until 1920. Should these things be wrong here and now just because they were there and then?

The making of laws and ordinances governing the public’s behavior has a history of not being on target. Robert Wayne Pelton has written about them in his book Loony Laws That You Never Knew You Were Breaking. For instance, in Alaska you can hunt grizzly bears but it’s against the law to "disturb a grizzly bear in order to take its picture." In Chicago there is a law which reads: "No person who is diseased, maimed, mutilated or any other way deformed so as to be an unsightly or disgusting object, shall expose himself in public view under a penalty of not less than one dollar nor more that $50 for each offense." In Tulsa, Oklahoma, dogs are prohibited form going on private property without first getting the owner’s consent. In 1930 the Virginia Legislature adopted a law entitled, "To Prohibit Corrupt Practice of Bribery by Any Person Other than Candidates." In Pocatello, Idaho, a 1912 piece of legislation says, "The carrying of concealed weapons is forbidden, unless same are exhibited to public view." Flowery Branch, Georgia has a law: "Be it ordained, and it is hereby ordained, by the Mayor and Council of the Town…that on and after this date it shall be unlawful for any person or persons to holler snake within the city limits…" And last but not least, the city of Schulter, Oklahoma, has made it against the law for a woman to participate in any form of gambling or game of chance while in the nude, while dressed in revealing or sheer clothing, or while simply wrapped in a towel. Nothing is mentioned about men.

One of the cornerstones of American life is the freedom to practice one’s own beliefs, free from the restraints of law, as long as the practice does not harm someone else. Yet a segment of society clearly wishes to impose its views and practices on everyone else. There are significant dangers in allowing such to prevail. It happened during the Spanish Inquisition and the totalitarian states of Eastern Europe during and after the Second World War. Depending on the times, the tack is different. "You will do it and you will enjoy it" or "You will not do it and you will not enjoy it." In other words, "if it’s not good for me, it’s not good for you." Protectionism may take the guise of virtue but it is fundamentally dangerous. History repeats itself, and someday those of the opposite point of view will be in charge and their rules will prevail - perhaps without mercy. No one is forced to buy a lottery ticket – yet!

Taxes, however, are a different matter.  Lotteries are not taxes.  Taxes are consideration that must be paid to government under the threat of punishment. Morality and the "American Way" are issues here. Which is more American and conscionable – the total freedom "to buy or not to buy" or the extraction of hard earned wages to be used perhaps for purposes against the taxpayers wishes under penalty of imprisonment? Lotteries are more democratic than taxation.

Furthermore, wars have been fought and lives have been lost over taxation while lotteries have never been the cause of such peril. Former lottery directors George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin and John Hancock have agreed with me.

Remember "No taxation without representation?" It was proceeds from the United States Lottery in 1777 that brought provisions for Washington’s troops that made it possible for U.S. coins and bills to bear images or presidents instead of queens and kings.

It’s true that lotteries are an inefficient way to raise government revenues when compared to the efficiency of taxation. But the comparison is ludicrous. It may be more efficient to stuff one’s seat cushions with porcupine quills than with goose down. However, the former alternative is pricklier in the end – like taxes.

Lotteries are also not charities and to pretend that they are for purposes of efficiency comparisons is also the product of a confused mentality. One can’t pull and oxcart with a hamster. The charity may be warm and fuzzy, but who in their right mind would expect that the public would give $13.5 trillion a year to their government voluntarily? Because government could never function under such a scheme, we have taxes and lotteries. Lotteries are products that must return value to the customer. If not, there’s no sale and no penalty. There is a penalty for not paying taxes – prison. Which is more in keeping with the Land of the free, lotteries or taxes?

Odds of winning.
Lottery critics often say the odds of winning are "slim and none" or about the same as getting killed by lightning. On the Arts & Entertainment cable channel last year a coin was thrown of a skyscraper and just missed a paper cup far below on the street. The mathematician doing the demonstration said, "Like state lotteries, close doesn’t count." Close does count. The highest jackpot odds game in the country is Powerball. But being less than precise in picking numbers can result in $100,000, $5,000, $100, $5, $2 or maybe just a buck. Being "not even close" counts in most lottery jackpot games and odds of 1 in 5 are common in scratch games. Last year in North America, lotteries awarded $52 million in prize everyday – that’s $36,000 every minute, 24 hours a day. Maybe the "performances" of critics would be more credible if they first learned to play the games that they’re critiquing. A lot of smart people vote to have lottery games with every dollar that they spend on tickets. Last year over 40 billion of those one-dollar votes were cast in North America in favor of lotteries. By the way – in 1995, lightning in the U.S. and Canada killed 91 people and 1,136 people won $1,000,000 or more playing lotteries in the U.S. and Canada. (4,520 won $100,000 or more playing lotto.)

I will make a couple on concessions, though. The odds of getting killed by lightning are better than the odds of winning Powerball – in Utah (where there is no lottery). The odds of getting killed by lightning are better than the odds of winning a Powerball jackpot – but only on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday. (Drawings are only on Wednesday and Saturday.) Remember, when calculating these odds, that anyone can be struck by lightning any time, any day. You can only win Powerball if you buy a ticket and than only on drawing days. One should ask, "What are the odds of getting killed by lightning on a Wednesday or Saturday in a state that sells Powerball?’

Using data from the National Safety Council, I have calculated that the odds of an average American being killed by lightning on any particular day are one in 1,178,989,420. Therefore you are 21.44 times more likely to win Powereball on Wednesday or Saturday with only one ticket than you are to be killed by lightning. You are 224 times more likely to win a Lotto 6/42 than to be killed by lightning. Here’s something to think about. Of the people struck by lightning in 1995, some were golfing, some were picnicking, fishing, boating, or hiking – not one was playing lotto at the time.

The question of whether it is appropriate for government to offer lotteries arises regularly. First of all the public has decided. Referenda to the people on lotteries have failed in only two states since state lotteries reappeared in 1963. The question then becomes should we do what the people want or protect them from what they want? In Europe, lotteries have been operating successfully for hundreds of years. They seem to have withstood the tests of time. In fact, many of those lotteries are older than the U.S. or Canadian governments. Time will tell which are the more durable institutions. Which is more "of the people, by the people, and for the people" – their lotteries or their governments?

If lotteries are indeed rational, relevant and reasonable revenue raisers, should government or the private sector run them? There is no perfect solution and "the grass will always be greener on the other side." Theoretically, government does not have to add to the cost by providing dividends to private investors. But business is not encumbered by government bureaucracy. The right solution depends on the situation.

In general, government shouldn’t operate what the private sector can do. Although the private sector is more flexible to do the job, there is some history in the U.S. to take into account. Namely, the private lottery operations of the 19^th century.

Private lotteries were prevalent in the nineteenth century until corruption couldn’t be controlled and congress made all interstate lottery activities illegal. Most state constitutions enacted after 1890 followed suit. State lotteries weren’t authorized again until 1963. The evolution of technology has made it easier to catch some cheaters, but it has also made more opportunities to cheat. Congress provided state lotteries exemptions from taxes and restrictions not afforded to private gaming entitles. How much can legally be in private hands supervised by a state is a question not yet tested in the courts. The important issue of security is also at stake. Unlike casinos with all of their operations within the confines of a building, lotteries by their nature require thousands of vendors at diverse retail locations and deal with millions of players at these diverse locations. Only a government agency can have the regulatory powers to assert jurisdiction over so many independent entities. Simple employer/employee relationships are not applicable. Policing vendors through private licensing agreements, as is dome for trademarks and patents on a civil basis, is not adequate. Only government authorities have the criminal enforcement ability to deal with such widespread opportunity for fraud. Therefore, significant government involvement to preserve lottery integrity will always be essential. However, the opportunities for private entitles to contribute technology toward the secure and efficient operation of those state entitles will continue to increase.

Benefits.
North America lotteries provide funding for education, economic development, natural resource protection, elder care programs, and more. They have contributed over $100 billion in annual wagering, lotteries directly or indirectly provide over 250,000 jobs. Over 240,000 retailers sell lottery products in North America. Last year they were paid over $3 billion in commissions.

Conclusion.
Lotteries raise money for good causes. They don’t target the poor. They have no more influence on the work ethic than inheritance, interest payments, and capital gains. Their fund raising is fairer and more American that taxation. Their games contribute to the economy as much as any other business activity does. Their odds are reasonable for a $1 risk. They have maintained a reputation of honesty and have earned the public trust and confidence. A clear majority of citizens in lottery states have for decades given their support. Despite the media myths and the crusades of social vigilantes, the honest and secure lotteries of the U.S. and Canada have prospered. Common sense among common men and women has spoken louder than the prejudice, the politics, and the uninformed emotionalism of egalitarian cynics.

¹ "If you look at all areas of gaming and who preys on people the most, I'd say the ubiquitous lottery has more opportunity to prey on people than casinos do.   Lotteries advertise, we [casinos] don't.  They have billboards that  say, 'here's your ticket to easy street.'  If you look at the odds, they're pretty stacked against an individual."              

J. Terrence Lanni, CEO of MGM Grand member
of the National Gambling Impact Study Commission

² e.g.  Iowa Daily Millions Game Player Demographics (error rate of +/- 7.5% at 95% confidence level)

³ Cited by Senator Paul Simon, Robyn Gearey, J. Terrence Lanni

⁴ Exd. 22:15, Deu. 23:19, Neh. 5:10, Isa. 24:2, Eze. 18:13, Lev. 25:36, Deu. 23:20, Psa. 15:5, Jer. 15:10, Eze. 18:17, Lev. 25:37, Neh. 5:7, Pro. 28:8, Eze. 18:8, Exe. 22:12