The Lotto Winner
Richard Goback | May 1, 2010When, as is usual, a proportion of the money an individual spends on a lottery ticket,goes in part towards helping to fund a charitable project, gambling becomes much more than one person winning or losing. It transforms into something far more altruistic, charitable and beneficial to society as a whole. This happens more and more often these days.
The lottery was born as long ago as 100BC, when the game of Keno was invented in China, during the Hun Dynasty. The monies raised from this early prototype were allotted towards defense projects, including the building of The Great Wall of China. Many other civilizations operated lotteries: that of the Romans being the first in Europe. What began in Rome as an amusement for the wealthier members of society, became, during the reign of the Emperor, Augustus, a means of raising revenue to keep the city in good repair. Prizes at this early date were usually valuable objects rather than cash.
It was not until many, many years afterwords that the first lotteries held in relatively modern times are recorded as having taken place, in 1434, in Sluis, a town in the Netherlands. It was around ten years after this that lotteries giving away cash begin to appear in Flanders, an area roughly comprising parts of modern day France, Holland and Belgium. These raised a slush fund to help the town paupers, as well as keep the town fortifications in good repair. It is reputed that the Dutch were early adopters of the idea of a lottery as a form of taxation. Belgium town council records show that in 1465, lotteries were used as a means to gain money to assist in the following important building projects:almshouses, chapels, port facilities and canals.
In the West, there was great appetite for a lottery. Late in the 16th century, Elizabeth initiated the original English state lottery. That this was a great popular success can be seen in the fact that four thousand tickets were sold for the original lottery, with the prizes given away tapestries, plate and cash. After this, the government thought it expedient to sell the rights to brokers, who would then hire agents all over the country to sell on the tickets o the great unwashed. The lottery continued until 1826, when Parliament decided to discontinue it.
Different forms of the lottery were invented and took hold, with lotteries played almost universally worldwide in some fashion or other. Soon, however, the initial noble intentions of the first lotteries were submerged in a sea of greed and corruption. Many private lotteries did not give the prizes as advertised, but maintained the right to substitute inferior prizes; inn the worst cases, no prizes were ever handed over to the unfortunate winners. The United States and Canada eventually banned all lotteries, and prohibiting all such. In time, however, new laws and regulations were decreed to ensure the fair running of the new generation of lotteries and games of chance.
Current practice is for lotteries to allot a percentage of ticket sales to good causes, and the upkeep of public buildings and parks etc. The lottery has even come into the modern era, with the advent of convenient online playing and gambling websites.
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