A competition based on chance, in which numbered tickets are sold and prizes given to those whose numbers are drawn at random, usually as a means of raising money for public or charitable purposes. Also known as state lottery, lotto, and keno.
In the United States, state lotteries are a familiar and popular form of gambling, with Americans spending some $100 billion each year on tickets. But, while it is true that state lotteries are very profitable and well regulated, the history of their emergence and evolution in the United States has been a somewhat rocky one. State lotteries are, after all, a classic example of public policy made piecemeal and incrementally, with little overall oversight or accountability, and in which the general welfare takes second place to concerns about gaming addiction and other societal problems that can be exacerbated by state gambling.
The word lottery comes from the Dutch noun lot, meaning “fate.” The first recorded European lottery was organized by Roman Emperor Augustus in order to raise funds for street repairs in the city of Rome. In later centuries, the term came to be used in the Low Countries for public drawings of tickets with prizes that were generally considered to be a painless alternative to paying taxes.
From the beginning of America’s colonial era, state lotteries were widely used to raise funds for public use, including paving streets, constructing wharves and even building churches. The popularity of the lottery grew quickly in early America, and Benjamin Franklin even sponsored a lottery to raise funds for cannons to defend Philadelphia against British attack. Thomas Jefferson tried a private lottery to help alleviate his crushing debts, but was unsuccessful.
As with other forms of gambling, the popularity and acceptance of state lotteries varies with public attitudes towards risk and uncertainty. The success of a lottery depends in large part on its ability to convince the public that the proceeds are being used for a good public purpose, and are not simply an additional burden on the already taxed citizens. This argument has been effective in many cases, although studies show that the objective fiscal condition of the state government does not appear to have much bearing on the decision whether or when to adopt a lottery.
The success of a lottery also depends on the effectiveness of its advertising campaigns, which are aimed at persuading people to spend money on tickets. This can be a problem, as critics charge that lottery advertising is often deceptive and commonly portrays odds of winning as more favorable than they really are (in reality, the jackpot is typically paid in annual installments over 20 years, with inflation and taxes dramatically eroding its current value), and that it promotes a false sense of urgency to act quickly. This type of slant in lottery advertising has led to criticism that the games are being run as a business and not for the benefit of the public.