Yup, there's property tax, sales tax, gas tax, etc.  Look at your cell phone bill and your home phone, internet or cable bill and the communications tax is very high.  (never can figure out all those surcharges!)  Depending on where you live, if you buy a home and you don't have any children, you still have to pay the same property tax for education as someone with 4 kids in school.  That's why I think a lottery is very important to a state as long as they are really giving the money to education.  Estate tax and gift tax is a good example of double taxation.  You earn money and pay tax on it.  Then you make interest on that money and pay tax on the interest and when you die, your heirs might have to pay tax on what you already paid tax on when you earned it, just because you were successful.  For most of us, it won't really matter anyway, unless you are very rich when you die or you can arrange to die in 2010.  However, if you give it away during your lifetime, you might have to pay a gift tax depending on how you distribute your money, but there are plenty of legal ways to avoid gift tax.  That's why a good estate planner is so important.

Anyway, I agree that the lottery IS NOT a tax.  It's a game.  If you went to an amusement park and paid to play, it wouldn't be considered a tax.  If you buy a raffle ticket to help out your local high school softball team, they don't call it a tax.  Jarasan put it best in a nutshell - just a bunch of busybodies.

I once had dinner with a man who, when I mentioned I buy lottery tickets, said to me "Oh, Dear, don't you know that's just a way the State gets more taxes from the poor?"  I never saw him again.  LOL

The case itself can't affect other states, but bluenoses in other states can use the same tactic. If any other state has different requirements for enacting taxes and their lottery bills didn't meet those requirements, then those laws could be overturned if the courts rule that the lottery is a tax. Such a ruling in NC would offer precedent, but it wouldn't be binding on any other state. The plaintiffs could use it to bolster their argument, but courts in other states would be free to ignore it.

 "Oh, Dear, don't you know that's just a way the State gets more taxes from the poor?"   

I have people tell me that the lottery is the "redneck 401- K" ...    same thing I guess.

They aren't using the "god" argument, because it has nothing to do with the legality of the law. Even if God himself drops by and says he doesn't like lotteries and all the players, retailers and employees of the lottery commission are going to hell, the Constitution still gives us some protection from his followers who want to force their beliefs on the rest of us.

Of course anyone with a lick of sense knows that their real complaint is based on religious beliefs. They're only using the tax BS because it may give them a chance to have the law overturned by the court, which is easier than getting the legislature to pass a new law to repeal the lottery.

Whether or not other people pay it has nothing to do with whether or not it's tax. There are all sorts of taxes that only tax some of the people. Nobody expects people who don't own property to pay "their fair share" of property taxes, and nobody expects people who don't smoke or drink to send in tax payments for the cigarettes and alcohol they didn't buy. Contrary to popular opinion, all taxes are voluntary. If you don't want to pay a particular tax just don't meet the requirements for paying them.

It's not the the plaintiffs are making the wrong argument. I think they're grasping at straws because that's the best they can do, but  the courts could decide that the lottery is effectively a tax and therefore has to follow the rules on tax legislation. I think that common sense says the lottery is a product, plain and simple, and the people who sell the product are entitled to make a profit on sales. States offer all sorts of products to people. I'm sure NC has state parks that charge an admission or parking fee, but I'm guessing that nobody has ever claimed that those fees are taxes. In NY the state runs 3 ski areas that sell lift tickets. Usually the money goes into the state's gemneral fund, and some is allocated back to the program that generated the funds. Sometimes they make a profit and other times they only offset some of the operating costs.

Other things are in a bit of a grey area.  What about car and boat registrations,  or hunting and fishing licenses? They're usually referred to as "fees" but how does that differ from a tax?

Usually it's a lot more like an Enron 401k. Over time you put in a lot of money and finally end up with nothing.

All I know is I have 3 weeks to hit Powerball.  Let 'er rip!

Clever analysis!  Except, of course, the lottery makes no promises to its players.  Enron cheated people out of money they put aside for retirement.

you can always drive to tennessee or south carolina if they take away your powerball...

Ha Ha - I don't like it that much!