The National Lottery - the facts
Created | Updated Aug 26, 2002
Everyone talks about it, 30 million people take part in it, very few understand it - so here are the facts. Every civilized county on every civilized world in every civilized galaxy has something called a National Lottery, or State Lottery. These glorified raffles have been used for millennia (on Earth, for example, lotteries were used in Ancient Roman times)by governments to raise money for "Good Causes". Through history, the Good Causes have been highly subjective in their goodness - the diseased plague planet Zarg, for example, used their lottery to raise money for the President's luxurious palaces and extravagent way of life. On Skaro, mad scientist Davros used lottery money to create the Daleks - possibly the most evil beings in the universe today. Another example - Earth. here, each contry has its own lottery - some use it to fund the army, the education system or to support their war veterans. In the UK, the lottery funds thousands of different Good Causes - at the time of writing there have been over 110,000 grants - broadly divided into the following catergories: Arts, Sports, Charities, Heritage, The Millennium, Health & Education and Small Community Awards. The strange thing about the UK however is its inhabitants' tendency to complain about this amazing institution - it raises for the aforementioned Good Causes something in the region of £30million per week (about 17 million Galactic Credits) and it has created over 100,000 jobs, yet the British Public does not seem to show any appreciation or gratitude. If you can get a visit to the UK, on Earth, it's quite remarkable. Only the "Moaning Murchnurdlers" of the planet Susan have the same capacity for self-inflicted misery and cynicism. The people of the UK have no knowledge of how the money raised is spent - they incorrectly believe that it is all spent on "Opera Houses" and that a huge percentage was spent on something called "Millennium Dome" - yet - paradoxically - they all believe that the money is spent unwisely, and fail to see the benefits to their everyday lives.
Much of the resentment to The National Lottery is due to the people being under the ill-informed impression that the company running it should not be running it on the basis that they make too much profit. The UK is unique - nowhere else in the galaxy is it possible for someone, or a company, to be "too succesful" - how on Alpha Centauri can one make "too much money?"! The people of this amusing little island think that the lottery should be operated by an ageing hippy, who has a long history of dodgy business dealings, has spent time in prison for fraud and has failed in at least 8/10 of his business ventures - ("Virgin Cola will become second only to Coca-Cola!" - oh. When exactly?). This misguided belief comes from the hippy's propoganda that he would "give all the proceeds to The Good Causes" - this is assumed to mean that instead of taking half a percent of the total revenue as a reward for a job well-done, like the current operators, he would donate that extra half a pee in the pound to The Good Causes. On the surface, this would suggest that the Good Causes would get more dosh. The reality is however that due to the hippy's lack of knowledge and experience in the area of running lotteries, his appallling marketing/gaming plan and the fact that his bid, in 1994 when the lottery was started, was bettered not only by Camelot, but five other comapnies as well, there would not be as much money raised IN TOTAL, so even including the extra half a percent that he would valiantly and selflessly (I don't think so) give up, there would still be LESS money for Good Causes - and surely, the whole point is to raise as much money as possible? This simple economic fact seems to elude all but an enlightened few.
Add to the mix the fact that seemingly intelligent people fail to understand how to play the game (one picks six numbers - there are ameoba on Saturn that could do it) or understand the fact that one game offers better odds than another, or understand the difference between the operator and the distributing bodies, that people with little savings and ordinary incomes claim not to play on a Wednesday because "It's only £4million" - it makes the whole thing even more bizzare when one realises that despite the general public's hatred and ignorance of the lottery, and the national press's desire to mislead the public still further, the UK National Lottery is the most succesful on the planet - and there are over 300 others. It has more people playing, bigger prizes, more places to buy tickets and most importantly raises more for Good Causes than any other - yet it turns intelligent, rational people into tabloid-fed lobotomised morons.
Much of the resentment to The National Lottery is due to the people being under the ill-informed impression that the company running it should not be running it on the basis that they make too much profit. The UK is unique - nowhere else in the galaxy is it possible for someone, or a company, to be "too succesful" - how on Alpha Centauri can one make "too much money?"! The people of this amusing little island think that the lottery should be operated by an ageing hippy, who has a long history of dodgy business dealings, has spent time in prison for fraud and has failed in at least 8/10 of his business ventures - ("Virgin Cola will become second only to Coca-Cola!" - oh. When exactly?). This misguided belief comes from the hippy's propoganda that he would "give all the proceeds to The Good Causes" - this is assumed to mean that instead of taking half a percent of the total revenue as a reward for a job well-done, like the current operators, he would donate that extra half a pee in the pound to The Good Causes. On the surface, this would suggest that the Good Causes would get more dosh. The reality is however that due to the hippy's lack of knowledge and experience in the area of running lotteries, his appallling marketing/gaming plan and the fact that his bid, in 1994 when the lottery was started, was bettered not only by Camelot, but five other comapnies as well, there would not be as much money raised IN TOTAL, so even including the extra half a percent that he would valiantly and selflessly (I don't think so) give up, there would still be LESS money for Good Causes - and surely, the whole point is to raise as much money as possible? This simple economic fact seems to elude all but an enlightened few.
Add to the mix the fact that seemingly intelligent people fail to understand how to play the game (one picks six numbers - there are ameoba on Saturn that could do it) or understand the fact that one game offers better odds than another, or understand the difference between the operator and the distributing bodies, that people with little savings and ordinary incomes claim not to play on a Wednesday because "It's only £4million" - it makes the whole thing even more bizzare when one realises that despite the general public's hatred and ignorance of the lottery, and the national press's desire to mislead the public still further, the UK National Lottery is the most succesful on the planet - and there are over 300 others. It has more people playing, bigger prizes, more places to buy tickets and most importantly raises more for Good Causes than any other - yet it turns intelligent, rational people into tabloid-fed lobotomised morons.
