A gambling game or method of raising money in which a large number of tickets are sold and a drawing is held for prizes. The word lottery is also applied to anything whose outcome appears to be determined by chance: “Life is a lottery.” A lottery is a form of legalized gambling, and the majority of states in the United States and Canada have lotteries.
A lottery consists of a set of rules and a pool of prizes to which all bettor entries are eligible. In modern lotteries, the identities and amount staked by each bettor are recorded electronically. A computer then shuffles the bettors’ tickets and selects winners at random. The winning prize may be a cash prize, goods, or services. Some lotteries require a bettor to present his or her ticket for verification before receiving the prize. Most lotteries offer the choice of receiving a lump sum payment or an annuity payment over time. In the latter case, taxes and other deductions can significantly reduce the amount that is actually received, as do time value considerations.
In the 17th century, records of public lotteries were found in towns of the Low Countries, where they were used to raise funds for building town walls and for helping the poor. In the 18th century, lotteries became popular in colonial America, where they played a significant role in financing roads, wharves, and buildings, including Harvard and Yale. George Washington sponsored a lottery in 1768 to build a road across the Blue Ridge Mountains.
The primary argument used to justify the introduction of state lotteries is that they provide “painless” revenue: players voluntarily spend their money (as opposed to being taxed) for the benefit of the public. However, these arguments tend to overlook the fact that lottery revenues are volatile and quickly decline once the “lottery fever” has worn off. Furthermore, the evolution of a state lottery is often piecemeal and incremental, with authority and pressures fragmented between different state agencies.
In addition, critics charge that a great deal of lottery advertising is deceptive, including the use of misleading statistics to inflate jackpot prizes; inflating the average winning prize; and portraying winners as happy and prosperous (the truth is that most people who win the lottery are neither happy nor prosperous), among other things. The vast majority of lottery players are male and high-school educated. In South Carolina, a survey indicated that 13% play the lottery more than once a week (“regular players”) and that 79% play less frequently than that (2 to 3 times per month, or “occasional players”). The total number of lottery participants is estimated at about 53 million. The largest jackpot was $57.4 billion in 2006. In 2004, the total amount of American lottery wagers was about $52.6 billion. This was an increase of 9% over 2005. In 2006, the top four states in lottery revenue were New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Illinois, and Virginia. The average jackpot was $49,836.
