Lottery is a gambling game in which numbers are drawn at random and prizes are awarded to the holders of the tickets. It is a form of gambling that is popular because it offers a small, potentially life-altering prize to people who have the money and time to participate. It is also a form of government revenue in an anti-tax era where state governments have come to rely on painless lottery revenues to pay for services like education and social welfare programs.

There are two messages that lottery marketers rely on, and both have negative consequences. One is that you should feel good about buying a ticket because it’s a kind of civic duty, and the other is that you shouldn’t worry too much about how much you’re spending because you could win big. But these messages obscure the regressive nature of the game and how much people are actually paying for it.

In the past, states promoted lotteries as ways to raise revenue without imposing particularly onerous taxes on the middle class or working class. That arrangement worked well for a while, but the reality is that most people are spending a small fraction of their incomes on lottery tickets, so those revenue streams will not be sustainable in the long run.

Moreover, when it comes to lottery revenues, policy decisions are often made piecemeal and incrementally, with little or no general overview. That leads to a situation where state officials inherit policies and dependencies that they can do nothing about.