4 ms·

There is still no law against spending your entire paycheck on lotto tickets, nor taking out a loan and spending it entirely on lotto tickets. The government se

There is still no law against spending your entire paycheck on lotto tickets, nor taking out a loan and spending it entirely on lotto tickets. The government seems to pick and choose what mistakes they allow their citizens to make.

Someone1234 8y ago
Nowhere in the regulations is government banning PayDay loans (now or previously). This is about setting limits on just how much profit they can make per loan (since financial complexity makes it trivial to hide the true dollar cost). And actually lotteries are heavily regulated, particularly in relation to odds, costs, and complexities. You know, when you buy a ticket, exactly how little chance you have.
- pjscott 8y ago
  That is, in effect, a limit on how risky their loans can be if they want to stay in business. The more likely someone is to default on a loan, the higher the interest rate needs to be in order for it to have a positive expected value for the lender. Or, to put it another way: the more restrictive the cap on interest, the more poor people become unable to get an emergency loan under any circumstances.
darkpuma 8y ago
With modern advances in law enforcement techniques for dealing with organized crime, the legality of state run lotteries should be revisited. The continued operation of numbers games in immigrant communities probably has more to do with inadequate policing in those communities than it has to do with lack of awareness for state lotteries.
- leetcrew 8y ago
  if you can only funnel people into the state sanctioned lottery by increasing enforcement in immigrant communities, doesn't that imply the numbers games in those communities are offering better odds than the state implementation? if so, what exactly is the state monopoly protecting us from?
  - darkpuma 8y ago
    > "doesn't that imply the numbers games in those communities are offering better odds than the state implementation?" No. It would imply that if you assume those number games are honest or that players can rationally and accurately assess the honesty of those number games. Neither of which is true. Why do you think the Nevada Gaming Control Board exists? Because organizations that run gambling operations cannot be trusted to stay honest, and because libertarian theories about consumers figuring everything out themselves and regulating the industry through market forces don't play out in reality. Government regulation is the only way to keep the gambling industry honest. The only other option is to tread on those snakes and stamp it out completely. > "if so, what exactly is the state monopoly protecting us from?" Fraud in the number games themselves, and the adjacent violence associated with criminal gangs who run numbers games. > "increasing enforcement in immigrant communities," This is something we should be doing no matter what policy towards gambling is decided on, because immigrant communities are entitled to the same quality of policing as any other community. The status quo of denying adequate policing to many of these communities is a social injustice.

Someone1234 8y ago

Nowhere in the regulations is government banning PayDay loans (now or previously). This is about setting limits on just how much profit they can make per loan (since financial complexity makes it trivial to hide the true dollar cost). And actually lotteries are heavily regulated, particularly in relation to odds, costs, and complexities. You know, when you buy a ticket, exactly how little chance you have.

pjscott 8y ago
That is, in effect, a limit on how risky their loans can be if they want to stay in business. The more likely someone is to default on a loan, the higher the interest rate needs to be in order for it to have a positive expected value for the lender. Or, to put it another way: the more restrictive the cap on interest, the more poor people become unable to get an emergency loan under any circumstances.

darkpuma 8y ago

With modern advances in law enforcement techniques for dealing with organized crime, the legality of state run lotteries should be revisited. The continued operation of numbers games in immigrant communities probably has more to do with inadequate policing in those communities than it has to do with lack of awareness for state lotteries.

leetcrew 8y ago
if you can only funnel people into the state sanctioned lottery by increasing enforcement in immigrant communities, doesn't that imply the numbers games in those communities are offering better odds than the state implementation? if so, what exactly is the state monopoly protecting us from?
- darkpuma 8y ago
  > "doesn't that imply the numbers games in those communities are offering better odds than the state implementation?" No. It would imply that if you assume those number games are honest or that players can rationally and accurately assess the honesty of those number games. Neither of which is true. Why do you think the Nevada Gaming Control Board exists? Because organizations that run gambling operations cannot be trusted to stay honest, and because libertarian theories about consumers figuring everything out themselves and regulating the industry through market forces don't play out in reality. Government regulation is the only way to keep the gambling industry honest. The only other option is to tread on those snakes and stamp it out completely. > "if so, what exactly is the state monopoly protecting us from?" Fraud in the number games themselves, and the adjacent violence associated with criminal gangs who run numbers games. > "increasing enforcement in immigrant communities," This is something we should be doing no matter what policy towards gambling is decided on, because immigrant communities are entitled to the same quality of policing as any other community. The status quo of denying adequate policing to many of these communities is a social injustice.