The casting of lots has a long history as a means for making decisions or determining fates. The use of lotteries to raise money for material gain, however, is much more recent. In the 15th century, for example, towns in the Low Countries held public lotteries to raise funds for repairs or to assist the poor. The first recorded lottery to distribute prize money was held in 1466 in Bruges, Belgium.

Lotteries have broad public support – in states with lotteries, 60% of adults report playing at least once a year. They have a reputation for raising huge sums of money quickly and efficiently, which is why they are popular as a source of tax revenues. But they also have a hidden message: that if you play the lottery, you should feel good because you’re helping the state.

Typically, when a state adopts a lottery, it legislates a monopoly for itself; establishes a state agency or public corporation to run the lottery (as opposed to licensing a private firm in return for a share of ticket sales); begins operations with a modest number of relatively simple games; and progressively expands the lottery by adding new games. This cyclical expansion of the lottery, which is driven by a need for additional revenues, has led to an insidious dependency on lottery proceeds.

Moreover, the state’s decision to introduce a lottery is often made on the premise that it will provide “painless” revenue, that voters will voluntarily spend their money and thus reduce overall taxes for education, veterans’ health programs, etc. But that dynamic is flawed. Almost every state that has a lottery has substantial specific constituencies for which the lottery is intended to raise money: convenience store operators (who benefit from high volume of lottery sales); suppliers of lotteries (who contribute heavily to state political campaigns); teachers in those states where the lottery’s revenues are earmarked for schools; and, of course, politicians who have grown accustomed to the large cash flow of the lottery and find it hard to reject future proposals for increased spending.