Should those on government aid buy lottery tickets?

[cthulu2016]

Last edited Sat Jan 28, 2012, 03:22 PM - Edit history (1)

Should those on government assistance buy lottery tickets?

(In my view they/we should be allowed to, but should not do so in practice. Nor should anyone else.)

Follow up question:

Why does the government promote behaviors so irresponsible that we (the citizenry in aggregate) are aghast at the idea of somebody doing those behaviors with "our money"?

"We didn't give you that money to throw away on the lottery!"

If the lottery is "throwing away" money then why is the state in the business of encouraging its citizens to throw away money, whether they are on government assistance or not?

And if the lottery is an awesome investment, as government paid for advertising implies, then why wouldn't we want the poor to avail themselves of an opportunity to get ahead?

Bonus question: Why do we imprison people who offer better odds than the state lottery? No state lottery has ever offered odds remotely as favorable as the standard organized crime "numbers game" that paid 700:1 on a 1000:1 proposition. (Usual set up was a numbers runner would take your pick of a three digit number for $1. The winning number would be something like the nest day's last three digits of the total shares traded on the NYSE so it couldn't be fixed. The runner would pay you $700 if you hit.)

______________

ON EDIT: This OP appears to be an optical illusion akin to

paris in the
the spring

The phrase "be allowed to" appears to be expected by some readers, and thus adds itself when reading the question. So many replies are replies to what readers imagine or guess the OP says. Whatever. Weird.

[former9thward]

1. No one should buy lottery tickets, on government aid or otherwise.

[surrealAmerican]

25. I agree.

The state should not be in the business of swindling people out of their money. It's an alarming symptom of a dishonest government that they are.


As to people on government assistance: they should have the same rights and protections as anybody else.

[Raine]

49. Yup, that was my first thought too.

Lotteries are nothing but a scam preying on people's dreams and gullability.

[etherealtruth]

2. A better question...

Should the poor (who dare to receive any assistance) surrender their personal freedoms?

I'm editing to add: I don't gamble (including lottery tickets ... 'cuz I don't, its not my thing). while I don't think gambling is a productive use of resources ... I do not think I should make decisions about what legal activities the poor should or should not engage in.

[JackRiddler]

12. If you read the whole OP you'll see you are misinterpreting.

The opening question (on which the OP agrees with you) was a provocative device to get into the real subject, a critique of the lottery.

[etherealtruth]

17. I agreed with the OP ...

I guess I did a poor job of mirroring ( I think my edit mucked up the intent further)

[HopeHoops]

3. Why not? It's just feeding the money back to the state. HOWEVER...

There is a disproportionate distribution of lottery sites that corresponds to the economic disparity of the areas in which they are located. It's legal, but so is booze. One of the things I like about the state-run liquor system in PA is that they DO NOT locate stores in economically depressed areas. Maryland does. The free market preys on what they consider fair game. Unfortunately, the state DOES consider the lottery to be "free market".

[cthulu2016]

4. Some would argue that is discrimination.

When the state establishes a monopoly on hard liquor sales the state has an obligation to serve the people. I fpeople in poor neighborhoods want liquor there should damn well be liquor stores in poor neighborhoods.

It is dehumanizing for the state to say, "You people cannot be trusted with having a liquor store nearby" which is exactly what the state is saying.

And if liquor stores are so detrimental why have them in anyone's neighborhood?

[HopeHoops]

5. (that's essentially what I was saying)

The liquor stores are still within reach, but they aren't predatory like the lottery sites are. Trust me, we've got a shitload of liquor stores. I've got one within walking distance and five within a short car trip distance. They aren't sparse, but they also aren't smack in the middle of low-income housing areas like the lottery sites (and pawn shops for that matter) are.

I'm not against liquor stores. But I do respect their restraint in that particular area. The lottery is a tax on the mathematically challenged.

[Hippo_Tron]

40. The lottery is not a tax on the mathematically challenged

It's a tax on people who get a rush from gambling and don't have the means to go blow more money at a casino. You don't need to take a class in probability to understand that you're not likely to win the lottery.

[Johnny Rico]

42. A tax on stupidity, in other words.

[Hippo_Tron]

43. NO, addiction and stupidity are two entirely different things

People who are actually ignorant or stupid enough to rationally believe that they can win the lottery are few and far between. Most people with a normal range of mental function realize by the time that they are an adult that they are extremely unlikely to win the lottery, even if they don't have any formal instruction in the laws of probability.

Most people who perpetually play the lottery perpetually do so because they have an ADDICTION to gambling and the lottery is the cheapest form of gambling. If they had more money, they'd probably go blow it at a casino, the way that middle class and wealthy gambling addicts do.

Addiction has nothing to do with a lack of education or with stupidity. It's a medical condition.

[Johnny Rico]

46. I wasn't trying to single out the lottery.

I would characterize all gambling where one can't afford to lose that way. I will grant that there might be a medical reason for this behavior in some cases, but whatever the root cause the behavior itself is foolish and irresponsible. Stupid, if you will...thus, the phrase.

If an alcoholic drives drunk, he has commited a stupid act. An accurate way to describe his behavior, regardless of his addiction.

[MineralMan]

6. While it's probably a bad idea for them to buy

lottery tickets, what people do with whatever money they have isn't something that should be subject to interference, as long as it's legal.

Being poor does not mean giving up your freedom of choice.

[customerserviceguy]

39. This isn't about giving up freedom of choice just because you're poor

It's about what you can do with the money that the government gives you. I'll admit, we should apply this just as well to corporate welfare, I'm sure that miltary contractors, bailed out banks, and farmers paid not to grow crops do equally stupid things with their money, and perhaps we should add them to the list of ineligible lottery winners as well.

[MineralMan]

52. I get a Social Securty payment every month.

Do you think you should be able to tell me how to spend it? Really? Screw that!

[customerserviceguy]

53. That's different

It would be like my former boss asking me to get up and be ready at 8 AM just because my company gives me a pension payment. Also, you get that check because of an entitlement, not because you begged, cajoled or lobbied your way to it.

It still isn't a bad idea to make sure that corporate welfare is spent wisely.

[killbotfactory]

7. We should also ban them from paying for entertainment, alcohol, tobacco

Also, no trips to anywhere except to see family members who are about to die.

Also, they should only be allowed to shop at second-hand stores.

Ban them from doing anything except sitting at home and reflecting on what horrible people they are for taking aid money.

And once they get a lucrative job, these rules should be enforced until they repay every bit of aid money they took, at 30% compound interest.

Any children they have during that time become property of the state, or given to rich people seeking adoption, or sent to space to build a moonbase disneyland for the 1%.

That's the price they have to pay for living in a free society.

[JackRiddler]

14. You should read the OP before making such a big speech - see post 12

[malaise]

8. Does your list of gamblers include the big banks who have been

gambling on mortgages and then having the government bail them out?

[cthulu2016]

10. Nothing in the OP suggests any restriction

The point is that if something is so irresponsible that some (not me) would favor a restriction then why is the state in that business in the first place?

Nobody should play the lottery, ever, for any purpose. The math is terrible.

[hughee99]

9. The lottery is essentially a "voluntary tax" with an incentive

for people to pay it. The government is guaranteed a profit, which is, of course, why they do it. The government is fine to promote irresponsible behavior so long as it's profitable for them. Just ask smokers.

As to whether they SHOULD be able to buy lottery tickets, I don't see how you can stop them, or any reason to spend even more money on enforcement.

on edit: While you can argue the government doesn't "promote" smoking, they certainly haven't taken any serious steps to stop it.

[JackRiddler]

19. The lottery is a scam and the state shouldn't be advertising it.

Voluntary, schmoluntary. States advertise it because they understand more tickets will be sold. That is the highest irresponsibility.

[hughee99]

20. It is completely voluntary, just like any other product that is advertised.

When the government collects your tax money, you're doing your duty, but when it ASKS for revenue offering you a snowballs-chance-in-hell of a big return it's irresponsible? The "profits" go to the same place as your tax dollars in most cases.

[cthulu2016]

23. The government should be good for everyone

Private business does not have that obligation. This is the point... government should have a higher standard of conduct.

If the IRS started adding offers to finance your taxes at 20%+ credit card rates to our tax forms it would be really shitty because it's the government and saying "because we can" is not sufficient.

[hughee99]

27. It would be really shitty

if the government started giving away money it didn't have to make sure that a private banks worth trillions didn't have to take billions in losses and could continue to pay out huge bonuses. At least if OFFERING me 20% financing on my taxes, I have the option to turn it down.

[JackRiddler]

24. Many voluntary behaviors are subject to restrictions on advertising...

because they are considered objectively damaging to the person engaging in them. There is no TV advertising for smoking. It is understood perfectly well in the social sciences (and by the experts working in governments) that although a behavior is voluntary, promoting it by advertising results in more people doing it, and thus the advertiser bears a responsibility. Cigarette makers were forced to pay enormous penalties for their historic practices to promote smoking, although smoking was always a voluntary behavior. They were accused of misleading people; it didn't matter that people "should have been smarter" about it. It mattered that promoting an image of smoking as something cool encouraged people to do it, just as images of lottery winners having great lives encourage people to play the lottery. The state supposedly exists to serve the interests of the people, not to fool them into wasting their money (and thus contributing in many cases to their impoverishment). If an alcoholic has stayed sober for two years, and a friend visits with a bottle of vodka and tries to convince them to get drunk, is the friend not responsible simply because it's still the drinker's choice?

[hughee99]

29. Unlike cigarettes and alcohol, the lottery's only

negative side effect is lost money. People don't get cancer or liver failure from scratch tickets, powerball, or keno. If I walk into the store, I can buy $10 worth of soda or $10 worth of lottery tickets. I'm going to be out $10 either way, which one does the government make more from? Which one is less harmful to my health? You can, of course, go with the "alcoholic" argument, but that supposes that people who play the lottery are all (or mostly) addicts who have to decide between food and feeding their addiction, but I haven't seen any statistic that would reflect that. Should the government make it's decisions based on what the most extreme of people could do?

[cthulu2016]

30. You seem disinclined to consider the government as

anything other than one more corporation.

The government has a higher obligation to not rip-off the citizenry. How difficult is that to see?

[hughee99]

32. If I'm not mistaken, right now, the government allows

one to voluntarily pay additional taxes that they do not owe (basically, allow someone to donate money to the federal government). It's the same as the lottery. If they ONLY allowed lottery tickets to be sold to the top 1%, would you be okay with that?

The government ROUTINELY rips off it's citizenry and has for many, many years, so I'm not sure that this is really an obligation of theirs (though I agree it should be). But being "ripped off" is when someone takes money from you against your will or does not give you what you was promised in return. The lottery takes your money voluntarily and promises you an astronomically low chance of ever seeing money in return, so it "delivers" on that. Frankly, I feel better about pissing away a few dollars on the lottery than I do about funding an SEC and congressional banking committees that turn a blind eye to issues until AFTER they've blown up and then hold hearings to find out how this happened. The answer to those questions isn't always the same, but they often manage to work around the fact that those who were SUPPOSED to be doing their oversight job were either incompetent or corrupt. I don't think I even need to go into the rip-off that is known as the defense budget.

[JackRiddler]

35. Your justified critique of other government ripoffs is completely irrelevant here.

[hughee99]

36. You have argued that the government has an obligation

not to rip off it's citizens, and while I agree that it SHOULD, I'm not sure it actually does, and in practice it actually rips off it's citizens on a regular basis and has been for a long, long time.

[JackRiddler]

31. You can't always justify something because it makes money for a "good" thing.

The government should (and actually does) know that money spent on the lottery comes from lower-income people and objectively damages their economic situation. For many, it is an addictive behavior, and rather than simply blame them, the government should consider factors like their children, or the impact of having more impoverished people in a neighborhood. The addict does not damage only him or her self. The government should (and actually does) know that advertising the lottery predictably results in more people buying more tickets. Any one of them is responsible for his or her own decisions, but the aggregate increase is due to the government's decision. The government's ad companies definitely know that they are using manipulative and emotionally deceptive strategies that completely distort the facts of the lottery. It is a scam - an open scam, in which the fine print tells you exactly why you are a sucker, but a scam nevertheless.

Here's a start: Would you object to printing the odds of the game in the same size print as the ostensible winnings?

Would you object to telling the truth about prize money? This is a big part of the scam, and may qualify as fraudulent under the law.

E.g., in the Mega Millions there is no $105 million prize.

Rather, when the prize is advertised as $105 million, it means there are two possible prizes:

- an average annual payout of $5million pretax for 26 years

or

- an immediate "lump sum" payout of about $33 million (based on current interest rates) after taxes (which will be withdrawn prior to payment). Pretax this will be closer to $55 million or so, depending on the state and city of residence.

To call either $105 million, as the advertising does, is a deception.

[hughee99]

34. I have no issue with printing the actual odds and payouts on billboards the size of the Superdome

and while I'm not arguing that anyone SHOULD play the lottery, I consider the lottery the lesser of many, many government evils. People who are truly addicted to gambling will find other places to spend that money. I don't believe that taking away this single outlet will help resolve their individual financial issues. At least this way, the government is able to recover some of the money that might otherwise be lost.

[JackRiddler]

37. Please consider the opportunity argument.

In criminology it's well established that the lack of opportunity reduces crime rates. For example, if the government had not set up a regulatory and enforcement environment that encouraged financial fraud, there would not have been a set amount of white collar crime that would have then migrated to commit crime in other sectors. Analogously, if the lottery wasn't available everywhere, and if advertising were not constantly reminding people to think about how wonderful their lives would be if they won a prize, a few people would no doubt migrate to other gambling activities, while most would simply not play the lottery, without replacing it with anything else. And again, if revenue justifies behavior you characterize as an evil (if a lesser one), what's the limit? Why shouldn't the government advertise for smoking, since it would recover money that might otherwise be "lost" to it by way of cigarette taxes? The government isn't supposed to devise ways to bilk people, and if it does so in epic ways, that is a) wrong and b) shouldn't justify smaller scams.

[hughee99]

41. It's a valid argument, but based on your argument so far

The mere fact they have a lottery at all is the problem. How many locations you can buy at and how much they advertise may compound the problem, but are irrelevant if you are arguing that the government run lottery itself is a ripoff. But the original lottery wasn't the government's idea, they took a profitable idea from organized crime and used it to make money for themselves. If the government stops funding lotteries, those games will return in different forms, and many will still find themselves spending money on the same things.

[JackRiddler]

55. I think the lottery is a legitimate means of preventing private numbers games...

and even raising a bit of revenue by offering the thrill of fantasy riches. But unfortunately governments have treated it as a means to expand the numbers games beyond anything that existed before, and to offer them 24/7, and to use lotto as a replacement for tax breaks they give to the rich.

In NY they run televised numbers games in bars that have drawings every three minutes. (I don't know if this exists online, ugh.) There are at least two daily numbers (3 and 4 digits), something called Pick 5 that's also daily I think, a lot of different scratch-card ripoffs, and three different big jackpot games (Mega, Power and old Lotto) each with two drawings a week. That makes six jackpots a week when there was originally just one.

It's the most advertised thing on TV, except maybe for car insurance. Billboards everywhere. This flood of state-approved propaganda emphasizes how your life can change, unconditionally, no warnings, no nothing. All you need is a "little bit of luck"?! At 175,000,000 to 1?! Such a lie, but it's become the American Dream! (tm)

This aggressive marketing suffers none of the limits or handicaps that organized crime once faced. Notwithstanding whether there should be a lottery, the proliferation is a problem in itself. It definitely crossed a qualitative as well as quantitative line long ago. If it were to go back to one jackpot a week and one pick-a-number game a day, with none of these infernal scratch offs or three-minute games that literally turn people into corner junkies, then people could have their thrills and anticipation, but most would waste a lot less of their money doing it. There should also be, as I said, honesty about prizes and a prominent display of odds.

Instead, New York is looking for ways to expand gambling further. Remember, these are the poor who are doing this, for the most part. (Here I use poor informally as a state of precarity that comes close to median incomes in New York City, where living expenses are so high; we should dispense with the myths that confuse middle income with "middle class.&quot Think again that children pay the price when their parents do stupid things (so the government shouldn't encourage stupidity) and everyone pays a price when too many people around them are impoverished even more than they would have been if this opportunity to blow it all on the lottery was not omnipresent and aggressively pushed.

.

[hughee99]

56. I think perhaps I'm not saturated with the level of marketing that you are.

In MA, I don't notice the commercials on TV (maybe I'm not watching the right channels) and you'll see the occasional billboard along the highways, but nothing like you're describing.

[JackRiddler]

57. The difference between New York and what you describe in MA is exponential.

Last edited Sun Jan 29, 2012, 06:38 PM - Edit history (1)

Concentration of population allows an extremely high incidence. Different lottery campaigns can be seen all over the subway, all year long. Commercials are constant and on all types of programming. Stores that sell tickets on every corner put signs up announcing current prize levels (lies, as I've explained). Of course it's on the local news. The pitch of the messaging often targets low-income people and has a shockingly anti-work stance for a state that's otherwise claiming it's "open for business" and people must work hard to bring us back to greatness. It's a crass contrast to the public health and behavioral propaganda from the same state. People often start conversations with the words, "If I won the lottery," and I doubt they would do so as often if they weren't reminded of the lottery's existence constantly. I'd have to think the average person is exposed to lottery messaging from New York State several times a day and that includes children, who don't care about the odds. Many of them will adopt the fantasy, looking forward to how rich they'll be once they're old enough play the lottery. Use of cartoonish/CGI characters and joke spots will appeal to them, whatever the intent.

.

[dixiegrrrrl]

11. Define "government aid" as used in your question.

[JackRiddler]

16. Doesn't matter. The thread title is just a rhetorical hook for a critique of the lottery.

[dixiegrrrrl]

21. Matters to me, thank you, and I would like the OP to answer.

[lumberjack_jeff]

45. But it does matter.

Social Security is an entitlement. You are entitled to benefits that you spend at your discretion because you participate in the system.

Welfare/food stamps/subsidized housing is something that taxpayers choose to provide to promote a civil, just and orderly society.

[cthulu2016]

22. The defintion is irrelevant

The question is not whether they should be permitted.

I think the poor and Jamie Diamond alike should be allowed to. And in both cases many would ask, why is a recipient of goverment aide (billions in Diamond's case) throwing away "our" money?

And it's funny that the state runs a racket so awful tat we would be offended.

[bigwillq]

13. Yes (nt)

[Bluerthanblue]

15. Hell yes!

Isn't that the epitome of the "american dream" in the minds of many? Having LOTS of money- more than you can imagine and more than you really 'deserve' for the effort you put into getting it?

No one will every convince me that Mitt Romney (or any number of incredibly wealthy individuals) actually toiled or 'earned' their riches.

Daniels response to the SOTU talked about the 'haves' and 'soon to haves'- how are those on 'government aid' ever really going to become "soon to haves" other than by some ridiculous fluke such as winning the lottery?

Playing the stock market is gambling, and people get payed to do that with other peoples savings.

[The Straight Story]

18. Mine goes to hookers, beer, smokes, so I got no complaints

[EC]

26. No one knows who buys the tickets since

we don't have to use id to buy them except for age. So what's the point of the question? Is this a judgement we are supposed to provide about the behavior of others?


Lotto's are dreams. Dreams without having to have the ability to do something other than put down a buck. Dreams of never worrying about not being able to pay bills again....

[cthulu2016]

28. You could always read the OP...

The question has nothing to do with whether it should be permitted, let alone with practical mechanisms for banning it.

[JackRiddler]

33. I know who buys tickets.

I live in a big city and I've been in bodegas and news shops in many neighborhoods where lottery tickets are sold - rich, middle and poor neighborhoods, of every ethnicity, commercial districts, etc. Even in the rich neighborhoods, people in fancy suits (and there are many of them in New York) almost never buy tickets. Lower-income people buy tickets. This is borne out by surveys, as if you needed to know.

[Proles]

38. *Should* they be buying lotto tickets?

Probably not. In fact, you could probably say that about anyone.

Should they be forbidden from doing so? No.

It's a slippery slope republicans would love to slide down. If you're to stop them from buying lotto tickets because that's not money well spent, then next it could be alcohol, or other "non-useful" items such as television, video games, etc.

[lumberjack_jeff]

44. It depends. Why do you as a citizen, provide aid to poor people?

Or are your reasons for providing that aid none of your business?

If your intent is to provide food and shelter to those who couldn't otherwise afford it, then how much do you need to pad the total to get past the "beer, smokes and hookers" threshold?

[Nikia]

47. A middle class friend of mine plays the lottery a couple times per week

I told him that obviously the odds were not in his favor and asked why he did it. He said that the ticket represented hope. In his case, hope that he could retire early and not have to worry about money again. I think that is probably even more true of people in need of assistance. They feel that winning the lottery is their only hope of ever having enough money. Maybe, a couple dollars per week isn't too much to pay for the poor.
If the state has a problem with that, they should not have a lottery because it is people who need hope that buy tickets. It is too bad that many Americans feel that they have a better chance at winning the lottery than making a decent salary.

[Autumn]

48. Should those on government aid be allowed to breathe?

Not according to fucking repukes and moralizing busy bodies.

[ZombieHorde]

50. The only people who should buy lottery tickets are those who enjoy playing the lottery.

Same goes for buying most things.

[ProSense]

51. Here's an idea:

The phrase "be allowed to" appears to be expected by some readers, and thus adds itself when reading the question. So many replies are replies to what readers imagine or guess the OP says. Whatever. Weird.

...It isn't necessary to use a RW meme ("Should those on government assistance buy lottery tickets?&quot to argue whether or not government should sell lotteries. No one is imagining that the question is a RW meme.

I mean, this seems to be happening more and more: scapegoat the poor (or use some other RW meme) to denounce a government initiative.

Also,the argument being advanced in this thread that only the poor buy lottery tickets is absolute hogwash. By the relative percentage of Americans, that would be true, but only because there are more poor Americans.

There are many reports of middle- and high-income Americans winning the lottery, most recently two financial executives in Connecticut.

There are people in offices around the country who pool resources to buy lottery tickets. Argue the point and leave the poor out of it.

Even if one wants to argue that lotteries are disadvantageous to the poor, why frame it as: "Should those on government assistance buy lottery tickets?"

Criticize the goverment if you want to, but there's no need to imply that there should be restrictions on the poor simply because they get aid.

What next: Should the poor be drug tested?

[backscatter712]

54. Why does anyone answer and legitimize the right-wing scumfucks who invent these memes? n/t