Arkansas Lottery Director Bishop Woosley has issued a statement explaining his opposition to legislation that would require that 30 percent of lottery revenue be spent on college scholarships.

He’s right, of course. The legislature has no business setting arbitrary takeouts from lottery income. The biggest expense in the lottery is the payout of winnings to players, not administrative expenses. To increase the share of revenue going to scholarships, it will mostly have to come from winnings in the form of longer odds to win. When the odds get longer, it can depress play.

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I’m not lottery fan, but I’m less of a fan of legislative micromanagement. It’s a backdoor way to kill the lottery. If you want to kill the lottery, just kill it. Slow strangulation only strangles college kids with steadily diminishing returns on scholarship expectations.

Here’s what Woosley said:

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