Dueling conclusions.THE NEW YORK New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of TIMES REPORTED last week that the Bush White House had dealt with a scientific conclusion by the Environmental Protection Agency Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), independent agency of the U.S. government, with headquarters in Washington, D.C. It was established in 1970 to reduce and control air and water pollution, noise pollution, and radiation and to ensure the safe handling and by simply refusing to open the e-mail. Well, that's one approach to unwelcome news. Another is to issue dueling conclusions of the type Arkansans were treated to last week. Lt. Gov. Bill Halter's "Hope for Arkansas" campaign issued a report projecting that a state lottery A game of chance operated by a state government. Generally a lottery offers a person the chance to win a prize in exchange for something of lesser value. Most lotteries offer a large cash prize, and the chance to win the cash prize is typically available for one dollar. would raise $100 million for college scholarships, while Arkansas Advocates for Children & Families on the same day issued a report concluding that the likely take would be about $61.5 million. Here's how we propose to deal with these reports: We'll accept Halter's estimate on how much money this very bad idea will pull out of the pockets of Arkansans because it actually tracks with our own research into lottery experience in neighboring states with similar cultures. But we also accept AACF's finding that poorer people tend to spend a higher percentage of their meager mea·ger also mea·gre adj. 1. Deficient in quantity, fullness, or extent; scanty. 2. Deficient in richness, fertility, or vigor; feeble: the meager soil of an eroded plain. 3. income trying to get rich quick--with the encouragement of their state government. While Halter halter the simplest form of restraint for the head of farm animals. Comprises a poll strap, a nose band and a halter shank that brings the ends of the nose band together under the mandible. Made of leather or cotton or manila rope. has dismissed this conclusion as an "urban myth," Duke University researchers working for the National Gambling Impact Study Commission in 1999 went a step further to conclude that low-income groups not only spent a larger share of their incomes on lotteries but "also spent more in absolute terms (Alg.) such as are known, or which do not contain the unknown quantity. See also: Absolute ." AACF AACF Aaroe Associates Charitable Foundation AACF Asian American Christian Fellowship AACF Accounting Academicians Collaboration Foundation (Istanbul, Turkey) AACF Aperiodic Auto-Correlation Function AACF Arab American Community Forum also cited research suggesting that lottery money dedicated to college scholarships tends to subsidize students who would attend college anyway, that it doesn't increase the net number of college degrees being awarded. If that's true--and we hope it isn't because it could also be bad news for something like Murphy Oil's El Dorado Promise--it should be the death knell for all of these schemes. Bottom line: State lotteries are bad public policy. The government should not be in the business of encouraging its citizens to gamble. If increasing college graduation rates among Arkansans is a worthy public goal, then it should be something that all Arkansans are called on to support. We should not ask our neighbors to gamble away $400 million in order to raise $100 million. |
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