Stop Predatory Gambling

Expanding the Lottery Class in Massachusetts

by spgadmin

Massachusetts announced this week residents will be able to buy Powerball tickets as a result of a new agreement allowing the multistate lottery game to be offered in the state.

Because Powerball and Mega Millions drawings are held on different days, there will be four big potential selling days for the Lottery during the week instead of two. The trend is obvious: as participation drops, the Lottery relentlessly pursues new ways to get more money out of fewer people by introducing more games that run more frequently with higher wagers.

So there you have it. In these economic times when low to middle income people are facing intense financial pressures from nearly every direction, government responds with a government program that shrinks the middle class even further.

What this is doing in Massachusetts is creating two classes of people: the Investor Class and the Lottery Class. While most of us are part of the Investor Class, putting money away in retirement accounts and 529 college funds for our kids, the state is turning tens of thousands of people who are small earners with the potential to be small savers into a new class of habitual bettors – the Lottery Class. They represent the 1 out of 5 Americans who according to the Consumer Federation of America, think the best way to achieve long-term financial security is to play the Lottery.

Bringing Powerball into the state “will be a win-win situation for everyone,” said State Treasurer Tim Cahill who also oversees the Lottery Commission. How can encouraging people to spend their money on a game that has 1 in 195 million odds be a “win” for them?

 It’s certainly not a win for them. And what makes this government program even more objectionable is that predatory gambling is the only product or service where the people who own it and promote it don’t use it. 

People just like Treasurer Cahill. “I don’t gamble,” Cahill said. “I never have.”