The Truth About the Lottery

Lottery is an activity in which numbers are drawn to determine a prize. While the practice of dividing property and determining fates by lot has an ancient history, the first recorded public lottery was held in the 15th century in the Low Countries to raise funds for town fortifications and to help the poor. Purchasing a ticket in a modern lottery can be considered rational if the entertainment value and other non-monetary benefits outweigh the disutility of a monetary loss.

Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery,” focuses on an unnamed small village that holds an annual lottery in June. This event is meant to ensure a good harvest, and one of the participants quotes an old proverb: “Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon.”

When state legislatures first approved lotteries, they did so with the idea that these new revenue sources would fill the coffers of government without increasing state taxes on average citizens. But the initial legalization of lotteries put a crimp in this fantasy, as proponents were forced to acknowledge that the vast majority of lottery proceeds came from the upper class.

Despite the fact that lottery players are generally rich people, the odds of winning remain enormously long. This reality explains why so many of them continue to play, even as they adopt quote-unquote systems and beliefs that are completely unsupported by statistical reasoning. The only other alternative to gambling is spending that money on something else, such as emergency savings or paying off credit card debt.