California lottery struggles with tepid sales

Comment #7

CASH Only — Thu, 12 Aug 2004 22:42:59 GMT

New Jersey had had pari-mutuel payoffs for many years.

Comment #6

DoctorEw220 — Sun, 18 Jul 2004 03:45:23 GMT

i do not like pari-mutuel pick 3/pick 4 games. i think that one gets robbed of their winnings with those.

Comment #5

benir4u — Fri, 16 Jul 2004 16:57:07 GMT

The California Lottery needs to be revamped because having a STR number in most would pay $500, STR/BX $250 and so on, that is not the case, it fluctuates which make people not want to play because of fear of having to turn it in for taxes. The system here gives people no incentive to play. I for one, spend a lot of money on this system and I am ready to give up because, as someone said earlier, the payback is terrible. I have personally talk to some of Cal Lottery employees and they have a f... [ More ]

Comment #4

r_billerey — Fri, 16 Jul 2004 14:26:16 GMT

Why Biggamelottery is not saling CALottery anymore. I use to play here.

Comment #3

johnph77 — Thu, 15 Jul 2004 18:35:09 GMT

The only valid argument they propound is the pari-mutuel requirement. All the other arguments have seemingly been successfully addressed by other jurisdictions. New York, cited as one of the more successful lottery operations, consistently returns less than 50% of income as prizes (38% in NY Lotto - see their website) and most other states are near that. Who's BSing who

Comment #2

liberal47 — Thu, 15 Jul 2004 15:54:46 GMT

I can't imagine a state like California being so short sighted in their thinking. First they need to amend that law to pay back more to the players, second they need to join the Mega Millions multistate game. Those two moves alone would fire up interest big time, not to mention boost jackpots.

Comment #1

qutgnt — Thu, 15 Jul 2004 14:38:47 GMT

Yeah another state like NY that is about making games as unfair as possible. No figure no one plays. The derby game and the lotto seem to have horrible payback %. Again if you raise the payback %'s you will get more sales and probably more revenues for the schools. But I am sure they will march out some other game with a 45% payback and the sales will be good for 3 months and then drop off. Unreal.

California lottery struggles with tepid sales

Lottery Post — Thu, 15 Jul 2004 13:30:15 GMT

Though California and its schools are begging for cash, one of the state's supposed gold mines produces roughly half of what it should for education, analysts say.But officials at the languishing state-run lottery say there's hope the operation will be shipping nearly another $1 billion annually to schools.It first, however, must succeed in throwing off woes such as legal restrictions on games, which some say are outdated in this age of widespread Indian gambling, and then generate an excitement... [ More ]