Should Gambling Be Legalized?

Gambling may seem harmless and an easy win with money, but it is really a tax on the poor and gives false hopes. The lottery and gambling is a tax on the poor in ways that people don’t see. As well as the tax, gambling gives people false hope.

When most people play the lottery today, they think about having wealth. Generally, people who win are happy about it whether they win one dollar or a million. The lottery in our society has grown to support education and it is often worth several million dollars. Usually, the winner of the lottery gains a lot of recognition for the money they win. But what would happen if there was a small town where people held a yearly lottery in which the “winner” was the member of the town who was not sacrificed? This question is answered in Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery.” In reading this story, and reading literary criticism about the story, there were many symbols and much symbolism in this story.

Local legal casino gambling has gained popularity in the United States after a long history of prohibition in many parts of the country. Casino gambling was outlawed in the early 1900’s before being legalized in Nevada and the city of Las Vegas in 1931. In 1978, gambling was legalized in Atlantic City, New Jersey (casino-history.org). Las Vegas continues to dominate as the number one casino destination. Atlantic City and New Jersey have taken a hit as completion in surrounding states increases every year. Pennsylvania surpassed New Jersey as the number two casino destination in the United States in 2015 (Tisdall 2). Today, 43 states have casinos (americancasinosguide.com). Since the birth of the Internet, gambling online has grown into a new industry. Online gambling is continuing to grow to this day and is an industry already worth billions. Many of the issues in today’s society and legislatures have moved away from the issue of if casinos should be legal towards the issue of should sports gambling be legal on websites such as draftkings.com and fanduel.com.

In Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”, the small village, at first, seems to be lovely, full of tradition, with the townspeople fulfilling their civic duties, but instead this story is bursting with contrast. The expectations that the reader has are increasingly altered. The title of this short story raises hope, for in our society the term “lottery” typically is associated with winning money or other perceived “good” things. Most people associate winning a lottery with luck, yet Jackson twists this notion around and the luck in this village is with each of the losers.

Other states lottery programs can be used as a blueprint to establish a lottery in the State of Alabama. As an example, the State of Oregon takes the lottery’s revenue and distributes it into four groups. These fours groups are “Public Education”, which receives 57%, 27% is given to the “Economic Development [and] Job Creation”, “Problem gambling treatment” receives the least, at a total of 1%, the last 15% is evenly divided into two groups of 7.5% which goes to both

The lottery in this country is a big past time for Americans. It gives hope to the hopeless and disappointment to a multitude of participants. A quick view of statistical information regarding the lottery shows that out of all people who take part in this country wide phenomenon, each individual person has a 1 in 175,223,510 chance of hitting the jackpot (AmericanStatisticalAssociation.org). The author of “Against The Odds and Against the Common Good”, argues that the state lotteries are “urging people to gamble”. Gloria Jimenez, of whom is the author of “Against The Odds and Against the Common Good”, creates assumptions that support her stance on her argument. Jimenez also uses the viewpoint from people who disagree with her logic, by stating various counter statements that contradict her stance. To fully understand Jimenez, we have to view the different factors of her stance on why states should not be urging people to gamble, assumptions that she makes to support her stance and countering views of people who don’t necessarily agree with her argument.

“Texas law says lottery proceeds are supposed to go toward education” (Oberg 2011). The lottery has only given one billion dollars every year to Texas Schools since 1998, but since lottery sales have become greater, the lottery has not been giving more money to the Texas schools. Even with the lottery earnings increasing the amount of money applied towards the Education Fund has not shown the difference of cash increase. One of the reasons why education is not

To what extent is the lottery beneficial to the North Carolina education system? What is a lottery? A lottery is used to raise money for the government and for people to win big money prizes. The North Carolina Education Lottery is a government-run organization that funds various education programs and school systems in North Carolina. If one hundred percent of lottery money went to education, it would only cover nineteen percent of the state’s total expenses for schools. The lottery is not beneficial to education in North Carolina if schools struggle to gain instructional supplies, and if the government has to cut spending for school funding levels to barely make it over the national average.

The Texas Lottery Commission is a fairly new entity in Texas that was established only 25 years ago. In history, Texas is known for its conservative values and policies, disregarding immoral practices such as gambling. In 1991, the Texas Legislature introduced an idea that could help change how Texas creates revenue to fund Texas education. The idea introduced was the establishment of a state Lottery, a form of gambling. Representatives introduced House Bill 54 to the House to establish a lottery system. It is later decided that Texans must vote to approve this new lottery. The citizens of Texas voted on this bill and the bill passed by a two-to-one margin. House Bill 54 is known at the Lottery Act of 1991. With the creation of the statewide

In her essay “Against the Odds, and Against the Common Good,” Gloria Jimenez asserts that states should not promote and advertize gambling. Jimenez lists many clever lottery slogans that are deceivingly interpreted. She also argues that these slogans advertise the advantages of gambling and playing the lottery because the money supposedly goes to things such as education and social service. Jimenez explains some arguments in favor of state-run lotteries, such as free participation and the creation of jobs, but argues that they are not relevant to the problem. She briefly touches on a statistic claiming that low income individuals are more likely to spend money on lottery tickets than their opposite, higher income

In light of Georgia’s lottery, which is supposed to help minorities to fulfill the American dream, it has been manipulated to help those who don’t need the help. By raising requirements such as increasing the number of honors and AP courses students need to take, altering its purpose of helping minorities in education, furthering my belief that using the lottery is unethical.

The author than fails to tell the source of this experiment so the reader of her essay is left wondering if it is even valid evidence from a reliable source. These viewpoints are better placed with a thesis that reads, “States should no longer be in the business of the state lottery.” The evidence she brings at that point covers most of her essay and I do not find them addressing the issue of “the states should not be in the business of urging people to gamble” (Jiménez 116-119).

The following two paragraphs are a summary of Gloria Jimenez's essay Against the Odds and Against the Common Good. States should neither allow nor encourage state-run lotteries. There are five major arguments that people use to defend lotteries. One is that most lotteries are run honestly, but if gambling is harmful to society it is irrelevant to argue if they are honest or not. The second is that lotteries create jobs, but there are only a small handful of jobs that would be eliminated if lotteries were put out of business. Another argument that would support keeping lotteries is that, other than gambling addicts, people freely choose to buy lottery tickets. This is true, however, there are misleading advertisements that may cause people

In today’s society we perceive the lottery as being a great fortune brought down upon you by Lady Luck. It is a serendipitous event, even if the person has done nothing to earn it. One would never see the lottery as an unfortunate occasion that occurred in your life because it is supposed to bring prosperity into your life. Also, one would not dare to think that winning the lottery would bring such repercussions as injury or death. In the short story “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson, the author could have used Mrs. Tessie Hutchinson as the town’s scapegoat due to their reluctance to change traditions, her horrible work ethic, and minority status as a woman.

“Chips of wood, Mr. Summers had argued, had been all very well when the village was tiny, but now that the population was more than three hundred and likely to keep growing” (Jackson, 2). The town never had an overpopulation issue, there was never a good enough reason to continue the lottery and even less start it for that matter. The social hierarchy of the town did not allow the people to have a voice and that made them feel intimidated. The people were almost programed and expected to accept and carry this unfair tradition; not because of the meaning of it but because they were scared to ask to let it go in results of things getting worse.