Need Help with Lottery/Gambling Tax questions

E

econodork91

Hi guys and girls,

I have a research paper due soon and it is on lottery and gambling taxes. I have done a good chunk of the paper already but I am stuck on answering a few questions.

They are:

1. Does increase in lottery and gambling taxes have any other effects?
2. What are the distributional effects of lottery and gambling taxes.?
3. Who pays for the bulk of the taxes: richer citizens or poor citizens?
4. What do governments spend lottery and gambling tax revenues on?
5. How much of the lottery and gambling tax collected goes to programs designed to help people to stop gambling?
6. Are lottery players wide spread?
7. What are some important attributes of State lotteries?

The main questions I need help answering are 5, 6, & 7
but answers to all the questions will help my paper look good.
 
Quote from econodork91:

6. Are lottery players wide spread?
More...

I'll take a stab at number 6.

Yes, very. Women have a bigger ass than men lottery players.
 
lol nice.

However, I really do need help with the questions. I tried doing some research with Google and whatnot but it yielded nothing.
 
Quote from econodork91:

Hi guys and girls,

I have a research paper due soon and it is on lottery and gambling taxes. I have done a good chunk of the paper already but I am stuck on answering a few questions.

They are:

1. Does increase in lottery and gambling taxes have any other effects?
2. What are the distributional effects of lottery and gambling taxes.?
3. Who pays for the bulk of the taxes: richer citizens or poor citizens?
4. What do governments spend lottery and gambling tax revenues on?
5. How much of the lottery and gambling tax collected goes to programs designed to help people to stop gambling?
6. Are lottery players wide spread?
7. What are some important attributes of State lotteries?

The main questions I need help answering are 5, 6, & 7
but answers to all the questions will help my paper look good.
More...

If these are your unanswered questions, what is in the "good chunk" that you've already done?
 
I work in the field of taxes, in addition to trading and I may be able to answer some of your questions, although they don't specifically pertain to the type of work I do. Much of my time is spent doing research on Title 26 and fighting the IRS when they don't agree with me :)) It's always fun to battle with an agent fresh out of school. Moving along.....

1. Does increase in lottery and gambling taxes have any other effects?
-->> Be more specific. Not sure what you're asking here.

2. What are the distributional effects of lottery and gambling taxes.?
-->> I'm assuming you're asking what the effects are when government distribute the earnings from taxes on gambling/lottery? If so, see #4

3. Who pays for the bulk of the taxes: richer citizens or poor citizens?
-->> Far and away the poor, or blue collar employees, or people who really, really hate their jobs. I hated the last job I worked and I bought lottery tickets. Now I love my job and I can't recall the last time I bought a lottery ticket. A quick google search on this will provide you with a good answer and a source.

4. What do governments spend lottery and gambling tax revenues on?
-->> In the state of Illinois, for example, lottery taxes are "supposed" to be spent on education. As you might expect they aren't. They go into the general fund and get spent on anything from education to a crew of 5 guys digging a ditch with 4 watching while the other 1 is 6 feet down.

5. How much of the lottery and gambling tax collected goes to programs designed to help people to stop gambling?
-->> You're gonna have to google/research this. You'll need a specific number with a cite. My guess is less than 1%.

6. Are lottery players wide spread?
-->> I suspect not. If you were to separate the sample into classes such as poor, a notch above poor, doing ok, doing well, well off, and filthy rich, you'd find an F-distribution skewed right. In layman's terms, a high number of poor and a notch above poor would be the biggest buyers with the filthy rich being the lowest number of buyers. In case you're not familar with what an F-dist, skewed right looks like I've attached an example. Poor folks are left, filthy rich are right. Y-axis is number of buyers.

7. What are some important attributes of State lotteries?
-->> Are there even any? I suppose it creates a few jobs and generates tax revenue, albeit largely at the expense of the poor.
 

Attachments

It took me 2 seconds to find this. I guess my answer about the F-distribution was wrong. It would be more like a normal distribution with the middle class buying most of the lottery tickets. Here you go. This will answer a lot of your questions.

http://www.mjyoung.net/law/lottery.htm

Quote from econodork91:

lol nice.

However, I really do need help with the questions. I tried doing some research with Google and whatnot but it yielded nothing.
More...
 
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