NM LOTTERY CHIEF WANTS TO CUT SCHOLARSHIP PERCENTAGE BELOW 30%
According to an article in the July 5, 2014 Albuquerque Journal, Lottery CEO, David Barden, is not happy that the legislature, after urging from Think New Mexico, a NM think tank, convinced the legislature to set a minimum 30% fraction of lottery sales to be spent on scholarships. He will try to convince the 2015 legislature to drop the 30% payment to scholarships, a move that would financially benefit lottery retailers, advertisers and himself.
Barden says that this move would actually INCREASE the amount of raw dollars spent on state scholarships, although his logic is pretty thin. He also suggested that his plan would help to raise the scratcher limit above the current $20.00 limit. Right now, Texas holds the prize for the most expensive lottery scratcher in the nation: $50.00. Numerous studies have shown that lottery scratchers are the most addictive form of the paper lotteries, and that it is not just the wealthy that buy the $50.00 scratchers.
When the lottery proponents were selling the legislature on the lottery, a lot of their main argument was that the lottery sponsored scholarships would help a lot of our bright, needy students afford to go to college. What various studies have revealed, however, is that the scholarships for New Mexico students go proportionally to the middle and upper financial class families. Research also shows that the poor and under-educated spend a much higher proportion of their income on the lotteries than the middle and upper income families. A perfect example of regressive taxation.
Lottery proponents assert that the lottery is not a tax, because it is a voluntary expense, but cigarette and alcohol taxes are also voluntary, so the lottery should just be considered another tax–the heaviest gross receipts tax in the state, since the average return (education) on money spent on the lottery is only about 30%.
The daily voice of the New Mexico State Government is not:
• Save for your education or retirement.
• Get a better education to prepare for your future.
• Live providently within your means and budget.
The daily voice of the New Mexico State Government is:
• You can’t win if you don’t play.
• You could win $_____________ (fill in the amount each week).
• It could happen to you.
The government is not actively promoting industry, education, and self reliance, but is selling false hope, appealing to the desperate and ill-informed.
As it is with state promoted and facilitated casinos, the lottery is an instrument of institutionalized unfairness, benefiting the wealthy while impoverishing the needy.
It’s time for the government to get out of the predatory gambling business.
