Steven Petrov
The Paw Print
The “Powerball” lottery has officially announced that three winning tickets were sold for the enormous $563 million jackpot for this weekend’s drawing. This jackpot was the 5th largest in the history of “Powerball” and that drew significant amount of attention from people all over the country. Millions of people spent hours and hours in lines trying and hoping to pick the winning combination of numbers, throughout all last week. However, there are 6 states – Alabama, Alaska, Hawaii, Mississippi, Nevada, and Utah – that forbid “Powerball” as well as “Mega Millions” and any other national lottery to have any activity in their states. The reasons for this seemingly strange decision of these states vary from being financial, moral or geographical.
The highly developed gambling activities in Nevada and more specifically the famous and luxurious casinos in Las Vegas, are the primary source of revenues for this otherwise “desert state.” There are no incentives for the State of Nevada to allow the existence of a national lottery in the region simply because it is an absolutely competitive product and service to the already well-established business model in the state. The government receives more than enough money from the incredibly high-taxed gambling activity on the territory of the state and has no interest in “stealing” from the market share of the casinos by offering an alternative form of gambling.
Almost the same reasoning applies to the state of Mississippi, where the gambling activity is also highly developed. The main gambling centers are the hundreds and thousands of ships that move through the state on the Mississippi river. The constantly moving nature of the gambling in the state has helped to reduce the problems with the local and highly influential religious institutions that stand strongly against any form of gambling.
The ethical concerns are even stronger in Alabama and the Mormon state of Utah. According to the “Church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints,” gambling in its nature is against the Christian faith (Mormon vision). This belief has been explained by this church’s followers by explaining gambling as an activity through which you are trying to acquire something by not giving anything in return, which accordingly to the Mormon leaders is a desire that can bring only destruction to one’s soul.
The state’s lottery regulations have never proven to be successful in keeping people from participating in the multi-million dollar jackpot national lotteries. It has always been easy for the citizens of one of the above-mentioned states to go to a neighbor state and purchase a ticket. Some states have realized that this is a loss of revenues by letting the money move out of the state and have subsequently introduced the national lottery, like in Iowa in 1985. However, some states on the other hand have been persistent in their rejection of the lottery, which have made citizens of Utah go to the neighboring Idaho for purchasing a ticket, and those from Nevada that feel “lucky” go to California to try their luck in the huge, nationwide lotteries like “Powerball.”
What’s Been Said…