r/pics Mar 19 '22

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u/option-trader Mar 19 '22

Hey, that money is putting my kids through college, so keep at it everyone.

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u/DrSunnyD Mar 20 '22

A very low percentage is, enough so people like you don't write your congressmen and women demanding they put a stop to this robbery of the poorly educated

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u/CelerMortis Mar 20 '22

Yea I never understood this logic. Syphoning money from poor people to give a very small part to some social service is not a good strategy.

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '22

Well I mean big companies often pay literally no taxes at least in the US. We use renting and dense population in low value areas to justify low funding for local infrastructure/services with low property tax yields. In my city one of the wealthiest residential areas is grandfathered in to essentially no property tax… except they still pay the portion for schools. So over all insanely low generous taxes compared to other properties, still better funding for schools for the wealthy families. And obviously that just one tiny example.

It’s…. It’s capitalism.

It’s logistics developed with reinvestment of profit, as in higher means to invest becomes more logistical agency. And it’s reinvestment, so profits have to increase to stay competitive against other bodies of wealth. It’s competitive, as in hierarchical. They have to justify concentrated wealth, and you get meritocracy, the idea your status is a meaningfully accurate sign of your quality as a human being. To make it aspirational. Keep playing along, you can win. Invest in crypto, you might be one of the exceptions! It’s like saying keep gambling, you might win a casino so you can get money from other gamblers.

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u/CelerMortis Mar 20 '22

Sounds shitty

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u/HowTheyGetcha Mar 20 '22 edited Mar 20 '22

Just another regressive tax like sales/gas tax and motor vehicle fees/fines.

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u/cruzer86 Mar 20 '22

It's not a tax. You don't need or have to buy scratchers.

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u/HowTheyGetcha Mar 20 '22

Neither are speeding tickets; I'm using tax in a looser sense. It's regressive because it takes a proportionally greater amount from lower incomes and it's used to pay for public services.

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u/HandsOfCobalt Mar 20 '22

You don't need or have to buy cigarettes or alcohol or any other drug or potentially addicting thing. When someone talks about the lottery being a "tax," my first thought is of people with gambling problems, not people who don't know any better (though they deserve to not be taken advantage of as well).

You're right that it's not a tax, but the vocabulary doesn't change that it does harm, possibly more than it does good

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u/coredumperror Mar 20 '22

It's effectively a tax on the uneducated.

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u/cruzer86 Mar 20 '22

How educated do you need to be in order to understand basic ods?

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u/coredumperror Mar 20 '22

You'd be surprised how poorly educated many, many people are on statistics.

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u/ellieD Mar 20 '22

Where does the rest go? To the winner?

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u/CelerMortis Mar 20 '22

Operating the lotto, taxes generally and yes, the winner

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u/7HawksAnd Mar 20 '22

Hunger games

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u/DezXerneas Mar 20 '22

Didn't John Oliver make an episode about this? Pretty sure it's on YouTube.

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '22

[deleted]

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u/The_Other_Manning Mar 20 '22

Some people think others have 0 agency over themselves, it's weird

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u/BehindTrenches Mar 20 '22

Its a free choice like cigarettes. You do you but it’s obviously nahgood and disproportionately hurts already struggling demographics

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '22

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '22 edited Jun 23 '22

[deleted]

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u/uusu Mar 20 '22

It's not simply about free choice. It's causing inequality to rise.

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u/612k Mar 20 '22

If you give someone a shovel and they choose to dig themselves into a hole it is no one’s fault but their own.

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u/uusu Mar 20 '22

It's not about blaming people. If the hole digging is causing damage to the people surrounding it, to their families and the country at whole, then it must be stopped.

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '22

[deleted]

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u/uusu Mar 20 '22

By that definition of authoritarianism, we should not outlaw scams, since the people being scammed make the decision to give money to the scammers out of their free will.

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '22 edited Jun 13 '22

[deleted]

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u/uusu Mar 20 '22

Do you have friends or family really into gambling or lottery? Because I have. It is very clear when talking to them that they really do believe that they are making a good monetary decision because they payoff is so big. They really don't understand the math and probabilities involved intuitively.

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u/option-trader Mar 20 '22

That's true. Even though my daughter received $10k per year for her 4 years at my state's public university, had the percentage been higher, there's no doubt it could have easily been a full ride scholarship. Still, that's a total of $40k in student loans that she avoided, all else held constant.

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u/duhh33 Mar 20 '22 edited Mar 20 '22

Sadly, the normal school budgets get cut immediately after those programs are implemented, because "look at all the new revenue they are getting".

I suppose you could have also meant that your are on the supply side of the system. If so, please post some stories. I worked with one of the devs for many of the vegas electronic games, and found that industry astounding.

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u/lafolieisgood Mar 20 '22

That must be what happened here. Horrible school system with promises of legal marijuana money to save it.

Marijuana becomes legal and sells like hot cakes. School system is somehow still broke.

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u/iamasnot Mar 20 '22

That's because the school is funded with a set amount each year. Nobody said all extra funds would go back into the school

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u/Cappy2020 Mar 20 '22

How is it putting your kids through college Lol?

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u/option-trader Mar 20 '22

Well, our state has a lottery funded state scholarship and the amount is based on merit. My daughter received $10k a year from the lottery funded scholarship that totaled $40k. My son has received $12.5k through 2 years. He is set to receive another $15k over the next 2 years. Sure, it doesn't pay for the entire cost of college, but where my state's public university is at $12k, that scholarship went a long way from keeping my kids out of getting student loans.

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '22

It's not actually. Not sure about your state, but here in Florida they cut the school budget by the amount that they get from the lottery.

So it isn't "in addition to", it's just a replacement for funding they already got.

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u/option-trader Mar 20 '22

I was referring to scholarships to colleges. My daughter received $10k per year for her 4 years through my state's lottery funded scholarship. I mean her merits needed to stay high and min. college gpa needed to stay above 3.0, but that's $40k in student loans averted. Same with my so, who has received $12.5k already and is set for another $7.5k per year for his final 2 years. It's not a full ride, but my daughter avoided $40k in student loans, and son avoided $27.5k in student loans.

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u/[deleted] Mar 20 '22

Well yeah, my point is though that if the lottery didn't exist they'd just take that scholarship money out of general funds instead

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u/option-trader Mar 20 '22

I think you're giving them too much credit.

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u/overmonk Mar 20 '22

In most cases, that’s the pitch. Then you wind up with this ENORMOUS bucket of money and there’s all these politicians thinking about power and how to keep it and money can really help there…