Feeling lucky?
Oklahoma introduces its new state lottery today. That means all six states bordering Arkansas have lotteries -- plus there are Indian gambling halls in Oklahoma, and casinos in Louisiana, Missouri and Mississippi, etc. Arkansas continues to harbor a gambling monopoly for the horse and dog tracks (and both will likely be augmented soon with video poker parlors).
With Arkansas gamblers able to simply spend their money across the state's numerous borders, is it foolish for Arkansas to resist establishing a lottery of its own? Should Arkansas join the vast majority of states that have a lottery devoted to education? Or is the lottery an immoral "tax on the poor" that encourages irresponsible and destructive behavior?
posted by Warwick Sabin @ 12:35 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
Now that North Carolina has passed a lottery too, there's a great possibility that a state like South Carolina could lose a lot of revenue down the road to the Tarheel State. See more in this week's column:
http://www.statehousereport.com/columns/05.1009.lottery.htm
it IS a tax on the poor. also, it creates false illusions. just ask the tech college students in SC who were told FREE tuition in 2000 in return for their votes, who now don't get anywhere near FREE tuition.
while i'm in no way doubting that our home-grown middle management workforce, which needs 4 year degrees, is slim and needs augmentation, nobody is showing us how all this money for college tuition is translating into test score improvements in K-12.
also, what about the billion dollars we borrowed for new school construction? and the shortfall in funding for the state's school bus fleet?
as someone who worked full-time while going to college, got (thanks to a loophole that disqualifies most adult college students from getting lottery money) no lottery money to pay skyrocketing tuition, and managed to graduate cum laude while raising a family, if Johnny wants to go to college bad enough - i say let him get a part-time job to PAY for some of it himself.
i say school buses and debt repayment should come FIRST.
false hopes to the poor, false hopes for educators, false hopes for college students. and exactly WHO comes out the winner from the lottery, aside from those who work for it or run it in their C-stores?
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