Lottery Critics

A game where tickets are purchased for a chance to win money or goods. It is also used to raise funds for state governments. Lottery critics claim it is a form of “regressive taxation,” in which the poor are hit harder than those who are wealthier (this is not the case with taxes on income, which are comparatively progressive). Those who play the lottery spend billions of dollars that they could have saved for retirement or their children’s college tuition.

Lotteries gained popularity in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as states sought ways to finance their expanding array of social services without imposing especially onerous taxes on the poor and working classes. Even famous American leaders like Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin held private lotteries to retire their debts and purchase cannons for Philadelphia.

In addition to promoting the illusory hopes that winning the lottery can offer, the commercialization of lotteries has produced a number of other moral concerns. The most obvious is that lottery advertising frequently misrepresents the odds of winning; inflates the value of prizes (which are paid in installments over many years, with inflation dramatically eroding their present value); and promotes an excessive preoccupation with money and the things it can buy. This is a form of covetousness, which God forbids (see Exodus 20:17).

Other ethical criticisms of lotteries focus on the fact that they draw heavily from lower-income neighborhoods and prey on people’s illogical hope that money can solve all their problems. They are often lured into playing the lottery by promises that they will improve their lives if only they can hit the jackpot.