AR Lottery Gave Less Than 19 Cents of Every Dollar to Scholarships in November

According to monthly reports the Arkansas Lottery released yesterday, the Lottery made nearly $36.2 million in November, but paid less than $6.7 million to scholarships — about 18.5 cents of every every dollar.

Since the Arkansas Lottery’s fiscal year began in July, roughly 17.5% of the Arkansas Lottery’s revenue has gone to scholarships. For perspective, the average state lottery budgets approximately 30%.

By our estimate, the Arkansas Lottery is on track to pay out about $85 million in scholarship funding in Fiscal Year 2018 — well below the $100 million Lottery proponents said Arkansans would receive every year.

According to the report, the Arkansas Lottery began offering 4 new scratch-off lottery tickets in November:

  • A $1 ticket called Holiday Cheer
  • A $2 ticket called Lucky Numbers
  • A $5 ticket called Bonus 7
  • A $10 ticket called Cash Diamonds

Like the Big Money Multiplier ticket the Lottery unveiled in September, Cash Diamonds  is an oversize scratch-off ticket that sells for $10 instead of the typical $1 or $2. The overall odds of winning a prize — such as a $10 break-even prize — are 1 in 2.89, but the odds of winning the jackpot prize are 1 in 320,000.

This is the same gimmick the Lottery has used since Day One: Roll out as much gambling as possible as quickly as possible in order to bolster ticket sales.

In this case, the Lottery is selling scratch-off tickets that are more expensive than most and offer larger prizes, but the odds are long, and in the end the results will be the same: Arkansans will spend — and lose — millions of dollars buying lottery tickets.

As we have written before, many people gamble out of desperation, and the Arkansas Lottery preys on those people with tickets like this one.

Below is a breakdown of Lottery revenue and scholarship funding so far this fiscal year.

Month Gross Lottery Revenue Paid to Scholarships % Gross Revenue
July $ 36,885,396.81 $ 6,661,762.99 18.1%
August 49,320,459.23 8,912,741.54 18.1%
September 36,405,731.14 6,755,333.93 18.6%
October 39,802,740.53 5,667,305.74 14.2%
November 36,186,107.78 6,691,228.00 18.5%
Total $ 198,600,435.49 $ 34,688,372.20 17.5%

Kroger Expands Wine Sales

Over the weekend one of our staff members captured this photo at a Kroger store in the North Little Rock area. It shows the expanded wine selection the store now sells under a law the Arkansas Legislature passed last spring.

According to our staff member, this section of the store “was all baby food and diapers, from one end down the other” before Kroger converted it into a wine section.

Why Does This Matter?

Many are concerned that this could set the stage for legislation down the road letting grocery stores in Arkansas sell hard liquor the way grocery stores in states like Missouri do.

Prior to this year, grocery stores in wet counties were generally limited to selling a few wines produced by small farms in Arkansas. Act 508 of 2017 lets grocery stores sell wines from other states, like California.

Last spring we said Act 508 would simply mean more alcohol in stores where children and families shop. It appears that prediction has come true.