Helping older Pennsylvanians
Dec. 10th, 2012 08:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dr_whomThe Pennsylvania Lottery's slogan is "helping older Pennsylvanians every day"—most of the money the state makes off the Lottery goes toward senior centers, Medicare, and other state programs that benefit people over 65. This is the focus of a lot of the ads for the Lottery.
I find this a refreshingly honest and decent way of framing a state lottery. Lotteries are often described as "a tax on people who are bad at math", and advertising that frames it as "you could win big!" is sort of unethically playing into that aspect of the lottery, since the expected value of a lottery ticket is usually way under 50 cents on the dollar. But advertising it in terms of "here's what we do with the money you spend" is basically making it into a subspecies of Charity Raffle, which seems ethically unobjectionable—instead of advertising it in terms of "you could win big!" it's advertised in terms of "you could donate money to a cause you care about." So... well done on that, Pennsylvania Lottery.
And they've also stopped making ads with that obnoxious puppet marmot. So... doubly well done, I guess.
I find this a refreshingly honest and decent way of framing a state lottery. Lotteries are often described as "a tax on people who are bad at math", and advertising that frames it as "you could win big!" is sort of unethically playing into that aspect of the lottery, since the expected value of a lottery ticket is usually way under 50 cents on the dollar. But advertising it in terms of "here's what we do with the money you spend" is basically making it into a subspecies of Charity Raffle, which seems ethically unobjectionable—instead of advertising it in terms of "you could win big!" it's advertised in terms of "you could donate money to a cause you care about." So... well done on that, Pennsylvania Lottery.
And they've also stopped making ads with that obnoxious puppet marmot. So... doubly well done, I guess.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2012-12-11 01:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-12-11 02:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-12-11 02:04 pm (UTC)