Over the past few weeks, we’ve focused considerably on how poorly managed the Arkansas Lottery is.  We’ve talked about the lack of accountability at the Lottery Commission; the Legislative Oversight Committee’s toothlessness in being able to provide any actually oversight; and even the Lottery Director’s move to award comp time to himself and some high-paid employees who do not qualify for it.  However, even though there are more than enough problems with the Arkansas Lottery, I don’t want to lose focus of one very important fact: We shouldn’t have a lottery in Arkansas to begin with.

There are several reasons Arkansans should repeal the lottery—and we will touch on some of them in the coming days.  One very good reason to consider abolishing the lottery is the fact that even though it’s called the “Arkansas Scholarship Lottery,” the money isn’t exactly going for scholarships.

Now, lottery proponents will stop us here and point out that the lottery is planning to hand out roughly $100 million in scholarship money each year—and this is true.  $100 million is a lot money—until you look at how many students are standing with their hands out, expecting to get the scholarship they were promised.

The fact is that Arkansas’ lottery allocates less than 22% of its revenue for scholarships (the third worst in the nation)—and there’s nothing in the law that could keep them from allocating less if they wanted to.  What’s more, in order to give money to as many students as possible, the lottery only awards each student $5,000 or $2,500 per year.  There aren’t very many schools in Arkansas where that amount of money will cover all your expenses.

Arkansas’ lottery was pitched as a lottery for education—something that would open the doors for students to go to college.  Lottery officials, however, have made it clear that scholarships are among the least of their concerns—that’s why they allocate less than 22% of their revenue for the kids and talk more about prizes than they do education—and that they aren’t interested in helping students who truly cannot afford a college education.  Otherwise, they would set aside more money for scholarships and would be sure that scholarship recipients at least got enough money to cover tuition costs at most Arkansas colleges.

Lottery proponents knew the best way to pass a lottery was to tie it to education.  In Arkansas’ case, however, the connection between the lottery and education is tentative at best.  That’s not what we were promised, and that’s why Arkansans should abolish it and find another way to send kids to college.