Is It Worthwhile to Play the Lottery?
By “Awake!” correspondent in Brazil
“THE major television event of the week is the 9:45 P.M. Saturday drawing of the TV lottery. Millions of Germans—lottery cards in hand—watch a mechanical scoop pick out . . . the winning numbers.” “The Sports Lottery is an integral part of the weekly routine of millions of Brazilians, from north to south.” Similar reports from other countries indicate the intense interest in lotteries.
The lottery seems to offer a means to get rich quick. ‘Someone has to win; next time it could be me’ is the hope that drives many to try their luck at lotteries. Also, the news media call attention to the good done with lottery receipts. For instance, the magazine Manchete stated that with the funds received from the Brazilian Sports Lottery, up to November 1977, there were provided 930 sports grounds, 336 gymnasiums and several other sports facilities. In Germany it is claimed that part of the money received from lotteries is used to finance homes for the elderly, youth clubs, river dikes and the Red Cross.
Nevertheless, thinking persons are taking a second look at the negative aspects. One editorial declared: “These lotteries absorb the savings, lower the purchasing power and impoverish families.” D. McCormack Smyth wrote in the Toronto Star: “Lotteries are damaging to the incentive to work and productivity.” Many began to play the lottery as a lark, then discover it’s a vice difficult to escape.
For this reason, Deputy Ruy Codo reportedly submitted a project to the legislature in Brasilia that would require that all forms used in the Brazilian soccer lottery carry the warning: “Gambling is a vice. Before staking your money, think of the milk for your children. In the soccer pool, your chance of winning is one in a million.”
‘But,’ someone may object, ‘think of the benefits for the poor!’ But who buy the tickets? Recognizing that it is generally the poorer class, one newspaper frankly said: “The idea of financing works to aid the poor, with resources taken from the poor, looks a little paradoxical.” Another commented that the estimated revenue of 900 million dollars derived from Brazil’s state lotteries is supplied by “a populace having acute difficulties in paying for the most elementary needs of life.” And two Brazilian senators agreed that lotteries “are contributing to an even greater impoverishment of the poorer States.”
A Better Way to Find Contentment
Admittedly, lotteries bring financial benefits to a scattered few. But to the vast majority who play them, the results are detrimental. Loss of incentive, impoverishment, enslavement to a vice and quarrels are but a few of these. Read in the Bible what can happen to those who ‘set in order a table for the god of Good Luck.’ They “go hungry,” “go thirsty,” “will suffer shame” and “will howl because of sheer breakdown of spirit.”—Isa. 65:11-14.
Better it is to listen to the wisdom of Solomon: “Do you know a hard-working man? He shall be successful and stand before kings!”—Prov. 22:29, The Living Bible.