Lottery, what will the company pay?

The opposition accused the government of giving away 100 million EUR of the citizens’ money to a private operator. The most important business associations have publicly asked the cancellation of the tender, in order to keep the license as a state monopoly and using it for social policies.

Many developed countries in Europe keep the National Lottery as a state monopoly, and have given it to private operators only for managing it. One of the best examples is Austria. The Austrian government owns the monopoly of the National Lottery, but they have given the administration to a private company, “Austrian Lottery”, know known for the Albanian public, being one of the two companies that will participate in the tender.

In 2010, the Austrian Lottery reported that the raw income by the sale of tickets and the organization of the National Lottery was 2.64 billion EUR, but the company took only 34.99 million EUR, or 1.3%. The rest was distributed for the players as prize, for covering the employee wages and the other administrative expenses, or have been used for financing social and sportive activities.

Even in the other years, the percentage taken by the Austrian company goes from 1.4 to 1.7% of the total. The National Lottery is not like the random gambling games, hence the governments keep it a state monopoly. The Albanian government says that besides the common taxes, they have added a 10% tax to the company that will win the license.

The question is if this will be enough for the state and the citizens to keep 98 or 99% of the lottery incomes, as it happened in Austria, or the license will be simply a source of large profits for the company?

Top Channel