For many poor Vietnamese people, selling lottery tickets is the only source of income. They start their day at 5 am with a small breakfast of rice and vegetable soup and then head out to the streets of Saigon. Each day Huong makes around 250 US-$ (an average of 11 US-$ per ticket sold) and on good days she can sell over 200 tickets. Her husband, Manh, helps her during the heavy 16-hour shift and depends on the success of their business for his income too.
Lottery online games are a growing industry worldwide and generate billions in revenue. They are a form of gambling that is usually free to play and offers large prizes, often in the form of cash or goods. Many are played by mobile phones, allowing players to enter the draw from any location, and many offer a range of games. Many are operated by lottery corporations, including GTech Corporation in West Greenwich, Rhode Island, which administers 70% of the world’s lottery-style games.
Until recently, only government-authorized and state controlled lotteries operated Internet games. But now, private companies are stepping in to take advantage of the popularity of these online games. In addition to online casinos, they are also launching instant-win games such as scratch cards and Keno. The games are becoming more popular and accessible as Internet speeds increase and more people have computers at home.
Lao government sources tell RFA that some lottery officials are rigging the system to avoid large pay-outs, particularly on numbers that are deemed unlucky by the public. For example, on Oct. 14, the number 509 appeared only as a 5 on purchased tickets throughout the day of the drawing, and was changed to 134 an hour before the drawing took place. The sources say that most of the private businesses involved in the lottery are run by people with ties to the ruling elite.
The legality of lottery systems is a complicated issue, as many states have laws that are outdated and not up-to-date with modern technology. For example, in 1967, Montreal mayor Jean Drapeau, trying to recoup money spent on the World’s Fair and subway system, introduced a “voluntary tax.” In exchange for a $2.00 donation, players could participate in a monthly drawing. The federal Minister of Justice argued that this was a lottery, but the Montreal appeals court ruled that it was not. The federal Liberal government later passed an Omnibus Bill, which brought up-to-date some obsolete gambling laws.