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State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

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Re: State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

#191

Post by Tozen »

Vespasian wrote: post #157
wildmanx wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For some people winning the lottery (even smaller prices) is literally the only "realistic" way of getting a moderate amount of "wealth" That itself is questionable. Let's say somebody of poor socioeconomic background wins $100,000 in the lottery. Would they suddenly make reasonable financial choices with that money and "make it"? It's possible. But it would require completely changing the mindset that made them pl…

Of course it's a poor argument and your arguement points in the right direction (though I don't have enough data to confidently make a statement about peoples ability to manage their finances) But people like to dream and everybody knows that someone wins the lottery.

But that's partially the point, people's dreams of escaping their situation is used to exploit them. Then the state is funneling the money out of the most poor and desperate, which is out right depravity, to benefit mostly everybody else except who they take from the most.

That's not a fair and equitable system, nor arguably the way states should be managing such lotteries, particularly the profits from them.

Re: State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

#193

Post by fsckboy »

ISL wrote: post #180
fsckboy wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> An aggregated million dollars probably does have more utility than a million single dollars. no, it's the exact opposite, there is a declining marginal utility to money. Think of it this way, homeless person gets a dollar, that's some food for the day. A second dollar is better, but it's not as valuable as that first dollar, but the second dollar is worth more than a third dollar; all the way up to Bill Gates, how…

I wasn't referring to the marginal utility for a person, but rather the economies of scale that come with focused capital-allocation. A million people with single dollars probably can't coordinate to build a consumer product. A Kickstarter with a million dollars may be able to generate a consumer product that improves the lives of a million people.

> A million people with single dollars probably can't coordinate to build a consumer product.

yes they can, it's called banking and the stock market. Syndication like that is why the market does not reward diversifiable risk

Re: State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

#194

Post by fsckboy »

TimPC wrote: post #160
fsckboy wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> An aggregated million dollars probably does have more utility than a million single dollars. no, it's the exact opposite, there is a declining marginal utility to money. Think of it this way, homeless person gets a dollar, that's some food for the day. A second dollar is better, but it's not as valuable as that first dollar, but the second dollar is worth more than a third dollar; all the way up to Bill Gates, how…

What’s the utility of being in a different economic class? There is more to money than just spending it and I’d argue there are large utility gains from crossing class boundaries. The academic models ignore any utility except spending and don’t even adequately account for things like more expensive high-quality goods being cheaper in the long run. So I don’t find this utility argument that proven or convincing.

if the marginal utility of wealth declines for an individual, it declines for a population. you have to show that these things add, but it has been.

in ye olden times there may have been strict class distinctions based on birth etc., but the notion of class you are using is hazy and undefined but basically is based on wealth, which does not slot neatly into categories but is continuous and differentiable and is a standard population density function, depending how you look, gaussian or pareto, etc.

you just accounted for higher quality goods being cheaper in the long run in your head and you make that assessment when you purchase, so why do you think markets or models of markets can't handle that or that the people who study them haven't thought of it? they have.

you being unimpressed with the argument is like me being unimpressed by what my doctor says. what are the odds he knows more about it than me, where "me" and "he" are extended across the population and all doctors?

Re: State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

#195

Post by zozbot234 »

fsckboy wrote: post #194
TimPC wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the utility of being in a different economic class? There is more to money than just spending it and I’d argue there are large utility gains from crossing class boundaries. The academic models ignore any utility except spending and don’t even adequately account for things like more expensive high-quality goods being cheaper in the long run. So I don’t find this utility argument that proven or convincing.

if the marginal utility of wealth declines for an individual, it declines for a population. you have to show that these things add, but it has been. in ye olden times there may have been strict class distinctions based on birth etc., but the notion of class you are using is hazy and undefined but basically is based on wealth, which does not slot neatly into categories but is continuous and differentiable and is a sta…

In theory, poverty traps can lead to increasing marginal utility of wealth, and make it quite rational to e.g. gamble on a lottery. However, the notion of a poverty trap is not very popular these days. The concept only ever had traction wrt. people in extreme poverty, and even for those it has now been shown that small increases in income are hugely beneficial. There's no need for what used to be called a "big push" to pull people out of the trap.

Re: State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

#196

Post by mullingitover »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #124
mullingitover wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you need money for education, tax people in a fairer way. I don't think anyone is compelled to gamble by the Georgia Department of Revenue. This is essentially Georgia saying, "We know we can't stop you from engaging in this vice, so we're at least going to make it beneficial to society in some way." Colorado and a number of other states are doing the same thing with cannabis revenue. I personally hate gambling,…

There is no reason to advertise and promote it. I wouldn't want the government giving out free samples of heroin because you can't stop people from vice.

I can see some merit in advertising it, strictly to drive gambling activity to the above-board option. There are plenty of underground gambling rings, the more people are aware of and use the legitimate option the less underground gambling will thrive.

Re: State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

#198

Post by LincolnPaige »

FredPret wrote: post #45
ISL wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Washington State Lottery has a slogan, "It's good to play!" It really should be, "Playing the lottery is a pretty terrible idea and we're going to, on average, take your money. If you still want to play, fine, but cheeseburgers really are better than lottery tickets. Wealthy people got wealthy by putting their money into index funds and savings accounts."

... or running lotteries

No post body was provided.

Re: State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

#199

Post by LincolnPaige »

david2ndaccount wrote: post #11

The argument for the state having a monopoly on lotteries is that if there wasn’t a legal lottery illegal lotteries would proliferate. Thus to protect people, the state should run it as it would then be guaranteed to be fair and free of the criminal element (mobsters, etc.). Ideally, the lotto would just take in enough to pay the winners and administrative expenses. However, most states have abused this monopoly and…

No post body was provided.

Re: State lotteries transfer wealth out of needy communities, investigation finds

#200

Post by Rury »

bogomipz wrote: post #175
Rury wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not as much as you'd think. For Illinois, lottery alone nets something like $3 billion, of which ~$700-750 million goes to funding public schools. Public schools expenditures are ~$35 Billion/year. So, less than 1/35th of costs. Add in the alcohol, tobacco, weed, gambling taxes, and you still not even close to covering half the state's school expenditures. Granted, Illinois is perhaps the most fiscally screwed s…

>"Public schools expenditures are ~$35 Billion/year." That all appears way off. "This year, the governor plans to increase the state’s education general fund by $498.1 million — a 5.4% increase — for an overall budget of $9.7 billion."[1] Additionally the Illinois state gas tax which is the second highest in the US is 40 cents a gallon.[2][3] [1] https://chicago.chalkbeat.org/2022/2/2/22914634/pritzker-pro... [2] htt…

That was just Pritzker's proposal for the state's portion of the elementary and secondary education general fund. There are other funds to account for, as well as the federal's contribution which are past proposal and have been enacted. Better source is to grab straight from Illinois.gov's site [1].

Look at: Fiscal Year 2022 Budget, Table I-A Operating and Capital (xls) - Cell J373 + Cell J438.

Total Elementary And Secondary Education = $27.7B. Total Higher education = $4.7B.

So ~$32.5B for FY22.

[1] https://www2.illinois.gov/sites/budget/Pages/BudgetBooks.asp...

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