While Massachusetts state government already pushes $20 scratch tickets and offers Keno games every four minutes 1500 times a week in almost 8000 locations across the state, new Treasurer Steve Grossman has declared it is not enough. In an Associated Press story, Grossman said he and his newly appointed Massachusetts State Lottery Executive Director Paul Sternburg are
“exploring social media as part of a wider strategy to boost sales, from selling tickets at Logan Airport to enlisting lottery sales agents who speak languages other than English to reach immigrant communities.”
As recently as 35 years ago, government ran aggressive campaigns (like the commercial below) to encourage citizens to build financial security by buying savings bonds. Today, government continues to expand a failed policy that preys on low-income people and traps them in even deeper personal debt. Steve Grossman is better than that. We as a people are better than that.
Les Bernal
Who says you can’t do both?
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p>In many countries, banks have been very successful in getting people to save by offering a lower interest rate but a chance to win a large amount of money instead. Unlike traditional lotteries, it encourages responsible behavior and is therefore beneficial to everyone, not just the winners. Apparently it has been done with some success here in the good ol’ US of A as well:
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p>http://www.washingtonpost.com/…
I, for one, love scratch tickets. I used to buy them a lot until I turned 21, at which point I spent ticket money on beer. Now that I have like, a life, it goes to pay rent (funny how life works like that, huh?) But something always struck me about a particular ticket.
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p>The $10 Texas Hold Em ticket was my favorite, and I bought way more than other tickets and I think I figured out why.
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p>See, I love to play texas hold em. It’s my favorite card game. When I saw the tickets, even though, rationally, I knew that the ticket would have, at best, 1 in 4 chances of winning, for whatever reason I approached the ticket from the psychological standpoint that it was texas hold em, therefore the odds that I’ll lose all 3 hands on the ticket is pretty slim. If I buy 5 tickets, the odds of me losing 15 hands is pretty much zero. So I would buy up the tickets because in my head, the odds were much better then what they were in reality.
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p>In that respect, I think the lotto is very clever in that it plays a game where it fixes the odds of winning much lower than what the odds of winning the actual game would be, causing a gamer to play or re-play more than a simple match the numbers game.
Maybe than can come out with a Spanish language scratch ticket and anger the left and the right at the same time.
To meet the minimum demand that prevents numbers from being an organized crime problem. Goosing demand beyond that is unconscionable.
why the government should offer up just a little bit of prostitutes, immigrant-forced-labor, cocaine, cock fighting, LSD, loansharking, copyright infringement, counterfeiting, trading in endangered species, and so on.
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p>You know, to prevent those things from being an organized crime problem too.
In fact, illegal gambling tends to increase for a number reasons. Untaxed illegal operators can offer better odds, bigger payoffs and loans that legal operations cannot. Law enforcement begins to view illegal gambling as a state revenue issue rather than a criminal activity, making enforcement less of a priority. Lastly, when commercial interests gained control of the lottery and casino business from organized crime, they obtained the ability and the license to “legally” abuse and destroy customers to an extent that was not possible when lotteries and casinos were run by criminals.
I’d love to see a study that shows how much in tickets is spent in each community, and then how much is redistributed to each community. I have a feeling that it would show that the MA Lottery redistributes money from poor communities to wealthy communities.
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p>Do you really think that the 5,723 residents of Dover had a net loss of $162,705 in lottery tickets (amount purchased minus amount won) last year> (they received this amount in unrestricted general government state aid, which unless I’m mistaken, is the amount of state aid that comes from the Lottery)
young people, using social networks. That is when he’s not too busy shaking down companies doing business with him for campaign contributions.
Why again did progressives support this guy?
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p>Certainly cities and towns don’t need the revenue. After all there are dozens of current plans to increase revenue and keep local aid and community services funded.
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p>Oh, you mean like the ones Steve Grossman talked about throughout his campaign . . .
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p>Steve has outlined a series of initiatives to help achieve those goals:
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p>Creating a Massachusetts Jobs Fund, using a modest amount of pension funds as a catalyst to spur bank lending to creditworthy companies.
Moving state money to community banks that have shown community responsibility out of big banks that are unresponsive on business loans, unwilling to help families avoid foreclosures, and charge exorbitant credit card interest rates.
Advocating for legislation to allow group buying of health insurance by small businesses.
Expanding the Treasurer’s financial education and empowerment efforts. He will seek to expand financial literacy to high school students, families, and seniors through partnerships with the private, non-profit, and educational sectors and make the Treasurer’s office an effective clearinghouse to support financial education.
A commitment to full disclosure and transparency in the operations of the Treasury. Using the Internet and modern technologies, the public will know who is doing business with the Treasury.
Opening the Treasury’s business dealings to all qualified parties who want to compete for it including small businesses, women-owned businesses, and minority-owned firms.
Protecting your money by bringing sound investment strategies and additional reform to the Massachusetts pension system. “My parents were products of the Depression,” Steve says, “They taught me these lessons: ‘Live within your means, protect your nest egg, invest wisely, do not engage in excessive speculation.'”
Bringing environmental responsibility to the Treasury by investing in green jobs just as we now invest in high-tech and life sciences, by pushing corporations in which we own shares to embrace sustainable practices, and by promoting conservation in school building construction and other programs managed by the office.
Advocating for corporate responsibility by taking a strong stand on corporate governance issues as a stockholder, including utilizing “say on pay” legislation to oppose outrageous corporate compensation packages.
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p>http://www.stevegrossman.com/i…
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p>Lotteries and casinos are the most predatory business in America today and they elude scrutiny because government is a partner. They profit only by luring citizens to live beyond their means, squander their nest egg, handle their money carelessly and engage in reckless spending. Any leader truly serious about raising the level of financial literacy needs to start by getting government out of the gambling business. The overwhelming evidence shows it is a failed public policy.
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p>Les Bernal
. .he’s targeting young people for gambling–targeting them for addictive behavior. You seemed to be amused by this, stryker57. You should be outraged.
Before leading the charge to exploit Massachusetts’ burgeoning lower class that disproportionately play the lottery and therefore regressively fund our government, why don’t you show some real management skills and trim the useless positions and bloat in the lottery?
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p>Any patronage jobs there?
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…to discover that the Treasurer and Receiver-General of the Commonwealth is putting forward a proposal that will raise revenue for the Commonwealth! He DID propose this during the campaign folks, so don’t act surprised. Scratch tickets are harmless, nothing like slots. As Grossman has pointed out many other states make money off of out-of-state travelers. I’m not terribly worried that people in a position to travel in the first place might be throwing away a few bucks on a scratch ticket or two. The Treasurer is responsible for managing the Lottery, so it’s almost as if NOT trying to increase these revenues would be irresponsible.