Gambling

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30724, 13 April 1965, Page 16

Gambling

Popular demands for more Mammoth Kiwi lotteries can be justified on both political and economic grounds. The politician is concerned to see that the people get what they want: if they want more lotteries, let them have them. The economist is concerned with maximising consumption, or welfare, depending on which school of economists he belongs to: when there is clear evidence of the demand for lotteries having outstripped supply, the supply should be increased. Seldom do politics and economics so happily agree.

It does not follow, though, that what may be both politically expedient and economically justifiable is morally right. The moral objection to gambling is its appeal to man’s baser instincts, greed, envy, and selfishness. No “ investor ” in a Golden Kiwi ticket who is honest with himself will pretend he is not interested in the prospect of sudden riches, or that he is merely making a donation to the more or less worthy causes to which the profits are allocated. Those who now object to any increase in the number of Mammoth Kiwi lotteries may well include many people who are not opposed in principle to gambling, and consider that gambling should be under State control. The puritans, with whom they have allied themselves on this occasion, probably consider their position equivocal: but at least it is realistic. Some people—possibly the majority of New Zealanders—win always gamble, whether the State encourages or forbids gambling.

Many people will gamble occasionally, as opportunity offers; and any increase in the number of opportunities provided by the State lottery can be expected to lead to an increase in gambling. A State lottery lends an air of respectability somehow lacking in most other forms of gambling. A refusal of current demands for more big lotteries would be welcome evidence that politicians can rise above political and economic issues.