Andy Rooney on the Lottery

[GobbleDog 822]

I suppose it's true that I'm too easily annoyed but there is nothing that annoys me more than the story we all see every couple of weeks about someone who has won the lottery. Newspapers and television ought to charge for advertising lottery winners. The most recent story was about workers in a meat packing plant in Nebraska, who won $365 million. What I always want to read is stories about lottery losers, there never are any.

 

There ought to be a law making it compulsory for anyone who reports the name of the winner of a lottery, to also give the name of all the losers. The names would be followed by the amount each person lost – just the way they give the amount the winner got.

 

Lotteries usually pay out less than half of what is bet. It's the worst odds of any gambling operation.

 

You see people buying lottery tickets all the time and it's obvious that most lottery money comes from the poorest people. They don't look too smart either. Some of them cash their unemployment checks and buy lottery tickets with that money. Then they need more help from the rest of us. There was a National Gambling Impact Study and in every one of the 48 States that has gambling - only Utah and Hawaii don't - the people who make the least gamble the most. Lower income people in Massachusetts, for example, spent 15 times as much on gambling as people who make a decent living.

 

I think we're all willing to accept some responsibility for helping people who can't help themselves. We approve of using some of our tax money for welfare to help the helpless. What I don't approve of is any government agency buying radio commercials to encourage the poor to waste what we give them on lottery tickets.

 

"You can't live the dream if you don't play the game, the New York Lottery. Attention lottery players watch the official televised lottery drawing every night on ABC 7. Tune in tonight and watch the winning numbers as they come up," one recent commercial went. I'm embarrassed to say that commercial was on CBS.

 

A lottery is a stupid, inefficient way to raise money. Governments are supposed to do things that we can't do for ourselves - like fight wars, enforce laws, prevent crimes and put out fires. It's outrageous when a government agency advertises to encourage anything as damaging to society as gambling is.

 

Andy Rooney

[Cdub100 3,395]

Andy Rooney is a dumb ass

 

Poor people are bad with money? Real shocker there.

 

Also he opens the story about a group of hard working people (if you've ever seen the inside of meat packing plant it doesn't look nor smell pretty) getting lucky then goes on to b!tch about poor people.

[jerryskids 5,221]

I'm not usually an Andy Rooney fan, but I couldn't agree more with this.

[Chronic Husker 85]

I'm not usually an Andy Rooney fan, but I couldn't agree more with this.

[Strike 4,003]

He's definitely spot on on this one. It's so focking hypocritical of our gov't to outlaw gambling and then set up the WORST possible gamble and try to legitimize it. The part about the poor is absolutely correct as well. Many of them see the lottery as their way out and waste a lot of money on it with pathetic odds.

[surferskin 30]

that's some truf

[GobbleDog 822]

I'm with Rooney on this one. Our government should not be in the business of selling lottery tickets to the poorest members of society.

[George Carlin 1]

This just in.

 

The government is more corrupt than the Mafia.

 

HTH

[GettnHuge 1]

which of course brings up: why not legalize more gambling? because people buy less lotto tickets.

[GobbleDog 822]

which of course brings up: why not legalize more gambling? because people buy less lotto tickets.

My only problem is that the government runs it.

[phillybear 365]

Andy Rooney has been dead for several years now. A stage hand sticks his arm up his rectum, and like a puppeteer, moves his lips to the words on the teleprompter.

[FunkyMcCool 0]

Though I think the odds are ridiculous, and it's idiotic to spend more than $1 on the lottery, I still like it. It's a VOLUNTARY tax! If you don't want to pay the tax, you don't have to: just don't buy a ticket.

[davebg 0]

Boy, it's a good thing we have serious journalists like Andy Rooney focusing on the issues that really matter.

 

alsonotreally

 

And to think that some people say that the CBS News division has lost some of it's journalistic integrity. I mean, it's not like 60 Minutes is one of their flagship shows or anything.

[parrot 789]

And to think that some people say that the CBS News division has lost some of it's journalistic integrity. I mean, it's not like 60 Minutes is one of their flagship shows or anything.

Yeah, and it's not like Andy has been doing this same schtick on various topics for about the last thirty years.

[davebg 0]

Yeah, and it's not like Andy has been doing this same schtick on various topics for about the last thirty years.

He really knows how to pull in that hard to get crotchety old fart demographic.

[EndGame 0]

This just in...

 

Your state's lottery keeps your taxes lower. It's true. If it weren't for people playing the lottery, there would be a LOT less money going into state programs.

 

Playing the lottery is voluntary. Some say it's actually a voluntary tax, but what other tax gives you a chance (however remote) to get back much more than you put in? Plus, at least in my state, if you don't win, the money goes toward something worthy. In Virginia all lottery funds are constitutionally required to go to education in grades K-12.

 

Andy Rooney needs to go back to his crypt, trim his ears and eyebrows, and find something else to b*tch about.

[Four More Beers 0]

They used to fund stuff like education fine with just normal tax revenue. Now the Lottery money goes to education (at least in FL) and they take that tax money and put it into pork projects. They never actually lowered anyone's taxes or did anything to improve education.

[EndGame 0]

They used to fund stuff like education fine with just normal tax revenue. Now the Lottery money goes to education (at least in FL) and they take that tax money and put it into pork projects. They never actually lowered anyone's taxes or did anything to improve education.

How do you think those pork projects would be funded if it weren't for the lottery money?

[Strike 4,003]

How do you think those pork projects would be funded if it weren't for the lottery money?

 

They're called pork projects because they're unnecessary. Therefore, they don't need to be funded.

 

But the point is that it's disingenuous to lobby for something under the guise of augmenting the funding for something people will support like education and subsequently having a corresponding cut of the same amount of funds which equals a net increase of zero. That's what happened in California or the lottery never would have passed.

[jerryskids 5,221]

This just in...

 

Your state's lottery keeps your taxes lower. It's true. If it weren't for people playing the lottery, there would be a LOT less money going into state programs.

 

Playing the lottery is voluntary. Some say it's actually a voluntary tax, but what other tax gives you a chance (however remote) to get back much more than you put in? Plus, at least in my state, if you don't win, the money goes toward something worthy. In Virginia all lottery funds are constitutionally required to go to education in grades K-12.

 

Andy Rooney needs to go back to his crypt, trim his ears and eyebrows, and find something else to b*tch about.

You really are naive, aren't you? Any income that the government gets becomes the floor for future income requirements. To say all of the same pork projects would be funded through higher taxes if there were not a lottery is just wrong.

[EndGame 0]

You really are naive, aren't you? Any income that the government gets becomes the floor for future income requirements. To say all of the same pork projects would be funded through higher taxes if there were not a lottery is just wrong.

Okay, so the pork projects aren't funded through higher taxes. The government pays for the pork projects, and then claims it doesn't have enough money for education .. or roads .. or jails .. or whatever .. and THEN raises taxes. You're the naive one if you think the government would just get by on less money. Governments simply don't work that way, unfortunately.

 

 

They're called pork projects because they're unnecessary. Therefore, they don't need to be funded.

But yet, they somehow always DO get funded ... don't they?

 

But the point is that it's disingenuous to lobby for something under the guise of augmenting the funding for something people will support like education and subsequently having a corresponding cut of the same amount of funds which equals a net increase of zero. That's what happened in California or the lottery never would have passed.

You're making my point. You just don't know it. So, there's a net increase of zero. What would happen if you took that lottery money AWAY? In Virginia that would mean a net decrease of $423 million in the last fiscal year. So, that means that because of the lottery, $423 million doesn't have to be paid involuntarily by taxpayers.

[jerryskids 5,221]

Okay, so the pork projects aren't funded through higher taxes. The government pays for the pork projects, and then claims it doesn't have enough money for educations .. or roads .. or jails .. or whatever .. and THEN raises taxes. You're the naive one if you think the government would just get by on less money. Governments simply don't work that way, unfortunately.

Sigh... my point is that their ability to fund more "pork," or whatever, was enabled by the extra revenue from the lottery. And once that stuff gets funded, it "must" be maintained, etc. Without the pre-existing income from the lottery, they would have had to explicitly raise taxes to fund the same amount. Which, while not impossible, at least would have required the public to have realized taxes were being raised, vs. the smoke and mirrors that the lottery created.

[EndGame 0]

Sigh... my point is that their ability to fund more "pork," or whatever, was enabled by the extra revenue from the lottery. And once that stuff gets funded, it "must" be maintained, etc. Without the pre-existing income from the lottery, they would have had to explicitly raise taxes to fund the same amount. Which, while not impossible, at least would have required the public to have realized taxes were being raised, vs. the smoke and mirrors that the lottery created.

Sigh... my point is that they would find what seems like a "legitimate" reason to raise those taxes. Here in Virginia, even with the Lottery, that "legitimate" reason right now is transportation. The Democrats are screaming that we need to raise taxes to fix our roads problem. Personally, I suspect that problem could be fixed by cutting some fat from the budget.

 

Unfortunately, neither of our arguments can be proven or disproven, so we could be here all night doing this.