education. Shaheen praised the increased sales with the glowing promise that the lottery could provide more money for education.Here's what I consider a more accurate translation: sales are up because the temptation is greater and the people most susceptible to temptation are increasingly desperate. Thus, the state manages to fleece its most financially marginal citizens to put more dollars in the education kitty, relieving its more prosperous population of footing the full education bill through an incremental rise in taxes.
Careful studies as well as common sense and simple observation make it clear that the poor play the lottery more, and spend a far greater proportion of their income, than do wealthier people.
North Carolina is not the only state to play such political tax reduction games, of course. Indeed, it was the last state on the eastern seaboard to adopt state-sponsored gambling as a revenue raiser, and it took underhanded, sleazy shenanigans to get it passed then. Most of the states use "education" as a catch-word to try making the lottery more palatable, with the same success one might get for spraying air-freshener on a hog lagoon.
Whether one considers gambling to be a sin is not the primary issue here: when state government knowingly tempts its most desperate people to spend their family's grocery money on lottery tickets, ethics have simply gone out the window.
And, while we're talking about money, did I mention that the new budget gives the lottery director Shaheen a salary of $246,000 -- 75 percent more than the governor? We not only support state-sponsored exploitation, but we pay through the nose to do it.
I hope mine is not the only nose to detect something rotten in the state of scratch-offs, Pick3 and Powerball.
8 comments:
None of the state lotteries has ever delivered on the false promises they made, and each of them has contributed to a growing gambling addiction in the states where they flourish. This is a moral stain on America, and, interestingly, one in which religious people, particularly Republicans, are completely silent.
saw the article in ther N & O. Loving the blog. (I'm in state for my birthday) Looking forward to getting the book.
Kenneth
Well, in N.C., it is an educational lottery, in that you take a big chance sending your kids to our public schools to get an education. I would hate to have to rely on our public school system to teach our kids anything anymore.
With that said, it only follows that N.C. would jump on the wagon of profiteers and sheisters sucking money from the poor. Just like GE couldn't wait to put our transformer plant in Mexico because other companies were doing it.
About lotteries: my figures are from 1998, when I studied university courses last. At that time, $12 billion was brought into states' coffers by lotteries. Like you said Tony, that was $12 billion the rich people didn't have to pay because the money came from the poorest folks.
The rich know better than to gamble on losing propositions (the lottery). They didn't get rich (mostly) by making foolish financial decisions, which is what the lottery ticket buying scam is.
I wouldn't buy a ticket now if my life depended on it. It is just so sad to witness those folks waiting their turn to spend their money on those tickets. I know the type from seeing them all my life. Having nearly nothing, and still hoping to invest what little they have in lottery tickets to get something for basically nothing, but the sad part is nothing is what they'll wind up with. Even when they win, they still don't stop playing. Same as the type you find around pool rooms. They just must spend all their cash on the chance to make an easy buck. It is so pitiful.
Our state and the others are no less than Mafia loan sharks and other hoodlums sucking money from those who can't help it. Saying organized crime is better than what we'd have without it is wrong too, because it condones what organized crime does. It legitimizes sin, and for a price, you can do or have anything.
Satan surely is laughing his horns off over this one, right smack dab through the "Bible Belt."
star
kerygma, in Alabama several years ago, a state "education" lottery (modeled after Georgia's money pit) was defeated due in much part to the noise made by religious groups and the political right. Unfortunately, it had less to do with the financial issues surrounding the lottery and more to do with gambling as a deadly sin. I don't think it's lack of involvement by religious people but lack of understanding the real issues that make a lottery such a bad idea for states to undertake it.
I was in a local grocery store tonight and, not being a native of the area or the state, for that matter, did I see a scratch game machine? If so, are those machines monitored to keep underage players away? I was just curious. Just seemed odd to me, especially considering the big deal people made about cigarette machines.
I don't recall saying anything about tickets being sold through machines. Scratch-off tickets are sold mainly at convenience stores, I think, from behind the counter. Apparently, they're big money-makers in the lottery game.
Oh, no, you didn't mention machines. And I probably wouldn't have noticed or given it much thought if I hadn't read your blog. I have to admit that I'm not very familiar with exactly how to play the lotto because we didn't have a lottery back home and, since I know a little bit about the mathematical odds, I've never really had a compulsion to play. It just seemed odd in retrospect so I was asking if that was what I thought it was since I didn't go over and check it out more closely.
Here in Red Springs there is a sctrach off game machine sitting in the store. It is at the front near the customer service center so that ideally they can monitor the machine, but as you can imagine anyone can purchase tickets from it. On a side note a SBC pastor in the county won $25,000 in a scratch off game not much over a month ago.
Post a Comment