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Not if the money is earmarked - you're making an unstated assumption that, say, if 5M is going into education, and a lottery starts up and brings in 5M more for a total of 10M, that the original 5M must be repurposed elsewhere.

That's not necessarily true in the first place, and what's more it depends on the appropriations rules in the jurisdiction.



I'm making that assumption because I saw exactly that happen in New York. The lottery money is earmarked, sure, but it simply replaces money that otherwise would have been allocated from the general fund. You could just as well earmark the lottery money for sanitation, cut the sanitation budget, and then put the money towards schools or other uses.


And the other 49 states and DC/PR?

Once again - what you're implying happens in all cases doesn't necessarily happen in all cases. That's literally my whole point :)


Here in DC it just goes directly into the general fund :)

I understand what you're getting at, but a lottery is really not a great way to fund education. I'd much prefer a less regressive form of taxation.




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