The math on this seems pretty simple. 21 of 24 states with education-funded lotteries actually didn’t increase or decreased school funding. If all the money is being taken from poor people, and they are cooking the books to make it so no actual growth in education funding is being met, and they are giving huge tax breaks for corporations in its place, maybe it’s not such a good idea. You are robbing Paul to pay Peter, only this time Paul was already broke and Peter’s a teacher who actually deserves to have better pay and smaller classrooms, only he can’t because you gave some other guy in a fancy suit all the money you were gonna pay Peter.
Now you may be saying to yourself, “But, Adam, if poor people just stopped buying lottery tickets, it wouldn’t be a problem.” To which I respond with, “But Internets person, they are actively targeting poor people and selling them a dream and making it easier to bankrupt them thereby making them even poorer and thereby helping to collapse our economy. I’d much rather education get funded properly instead of finding an easy loophole from which corporations can escape from at their leisure.”
So do me a favor and help make sure the Internets understand that lotteries are awful. I’ll owe you one. As long as I don’t buy a lottery ticket, I’ll be able to pay you back.
