That really depends on your perspective. I personally think that using wealth as a proxy for... well, really for anything other than wealth, but in this context risk assessment capability and fiscal planning ability, is terrible public policy. If you're concerned with people making poor financial decisions, then you should focus on providing better financial education, instead of restricting the fiscal agency of everyone else in the same income bracket. But that's another discussion entirely.
What I am definitely arguing here and now is that there is an inherent hypocrisy in the way we legally treat lotteries and the way we treat investment. Both are seen by their "players" as vehicles for potential financial windfall, and the riskier and less responsible of the two is wholly unregulated and even state-encouraged, while the other is tightly controlled and very difficult to get involved in.
> What I am definitely arguing here and now is that there is an inherent hypocrisy in the way we legally treat lotteries ...
Yes, and I just said we should regulate lotteries tightly and limit how much people can gamble on them. That removes that hypocrisy.
> That really depends on your perspective. I personally think that using wealth as a proxy for... well, really for anything other than wealth, ...
If you read my other comment, it has more to do with the risk of them surviving [financially] poor decision making.
Someone who makes $100k and puts $10k into risky bets is more likely to survive than someone who makes $30k and does the same thing. Its a question of scale.
> then you should focus on providing better financial education, instead of restricting the fiscal agency of everyone else in the same income bracket.
Education requires the student to be motivated to learn. There are plenty of resources to learn about financial decisions and community colleges teach relatively cheap personal finance classes.
What I am definitely arguing here and now is that there is an inherent hypocrisy in the way we legally treat lotteries and the way we treat investment. Both are seen by their "players" as vehicles for potential financial windfall, and the riskier and less responsible of the two is wholly unregulated and even state-encouraged, while the other is tightly controlled and very difficult to get involved in.