1988/03/01 by MARY O. BORG, Mary O. Borg, PAUL M. MASON +1 · 105 citations
Business, Management and Accounting · Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Psychology · #Actuarial science #Beneficiary #Business #Demographic economics #Economics #Finance #Financial Literacy, Pension, Retirement Analysis #Gambling Behavior and Treatments #Labour economics #Law #Lottery #Microeconomics #Political science #Public economics #Revenue #Sports Analytics and Performance #Statutory law #Tax revenue
paper · doi:10.1086/ntj41788710
published in National Tax Journal 41(1), 75-85 (University of Chicago Press)
openalex publication_date 1988/03/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/22
The evidence in the scholarly literature regarding lottery incidence has universally supported the notion that the tax inherent in the lottery is regressive. Our results confirm this conclusion, but go a number of steps further. Results of a study of 518 Illinois state lottery winners indicate that the regressivity of the lottery tax remains when one investigates the lottery's budgetary incidence. Specifically, deducting the benefits of education (the budget recipient of lottery revenues) received by the average lottery playing household in Illinois from their lottery ticket expenditures reduces the regressivity but falls far short of eliminating it. In addition, the results imply that age, race, and place of residence affect the propensity to play the lottery, and that it is likely that the statutory recipient of the lottery revenues is unlikely to be the actual beneficiary.