A competition based on chance, in which numbered tickets are sold and prizes are given to the holders of numbers drawn at random. Most often, it is used as a method of raising money for the state or a charity.
Although casting lots for making decisions and determining fates has a long record in human history, lotteries as methods of raising public funds are more recent. In the US, state lotteries date to 1776, when the Continental Congress voted to sell tickets for a lottery to raise money for the Revolution. Privately organized lotteries were common in England and the United States before that and provided many public services, including building Harvard, Dartmouth, Yale, King’s College (now Columbia), Union, and Brown.
During the first half of this century, state lotteries were a key source of tax revenue in most states and allowed government to expand its array of services without increasing taxes on working families and the middle class. But, as lotteries became a permanent feature of the national economy, criticisms focused on lottery advertising, compulsive gambling, and its regressive impact on lower-income groups.
In general, critics argue that state governments are too dependent on lotteries for their own financial health and are therefore vulnerable to the same kinds of pressures on government spending as other institutions that profit from gambling, such as casinos and professional sports teams. Other analysts, however, have found that the popularity of lotteries is not closely related to the actual fiscal health of state governments and that public approval of lotteries is likely to remain high regardless of their objective fiscal condition.
