A lottery is a game of chance where multiple people buy tickets for a chance to win a large sum of money, sometimes even millions. Financial lotteries are run by governments, but are also played by private individuals. While winning a lot of money is not impossible, the odds are very slim. Often, those who win the lottery must pay taxes on their winnings, and often go bankrupt within a few years. Despite these drawbacks, Americans spend over $80 Billion per year on the lottery, and many of them have little to no emergency savings or debt repayment plan.
Shirley Jackson’s story “The Lottery” is a tale of morality and social justice. It teaches that we must be aware of the injustices in our society and question authority. It is important to protest if something seems unfair, and we should not simply accept the status quo.
The story takes place in a small, rural American village where tradition and custom reign supreme. The villagers eat, drink and gossip together daily and are very friendly. However, their kindness masks a deceiving nature. The events in the story show that evil is everywhere, even in small, seemingly peaceful communities.
In the beginning, the story introduces us to a lottery that is being planned by Mr. Summers and Mr. Graves. They plan to purchase numbered tickets for the big families of the town, one ticket per family. The tickets are then drawn at random. While there is some strategy involved, such as picking numbers that haven’t been drawn recently, the outcome of a lottery is determined by chance.
After the lottery is established, discussions and criticisms change focus to specific features of operation, including its alleged compulsive gambling addiction problem and its regressive impact on lower-income communities. While these issues are legitimate, they should be addressed separately from the issue of whether a lottery is a desirable public policy.
The primary argument in favor of lotteries is that they allow state governments to raise significant revenue without raising taxes. In an anti-tax era, this has proven to be a potent political appeal. However, studies have shown that the popularity of lotteries does not correlate at all with the actual fiscal conditions of a state, and that they are able to gain broad public approval irrespective of whether they are in a state’s best financial interests. Moreover, the promotional campaigns for lotteries are oriented to maximizing revenues, and they necessarily promote gambling in ways that may be harmful to the poor or problem gamblers.