Titel British National Lottery is the one which returns the most to society in the world Autor/Erfasser externe Quelle System powered by HELP.ch

It returned us$ 4.05 billion in the 2005/6 financial year 
(UK).- In 2005/06 the UK National Lottery returned more to society (payments to good 
causes and Government) than any other lottery in the world, both as an absolute total 
including investment income us$ 4.05 billion and a proportion of sales (41%).

Although the UK National Lottery is currently the 5th largest lottery in the world (as 
ranked by total sales) it returns a higher absolute amount to society than any other 
lottery - including those that operate games that the UK National Lottery is prohibited 
from offering.

The analysis highlights that the UK National Lottery returned us$ 4.05 billion to 
society in the 2005/6 financial year. The latest figures for international lotteries 
show that the next highest returns were from Japan and Spain, where us$ 4 billion and 
us$ 3.9 billion were returned back to society respectively. 

The UK National Lottery also returns more to society as a percentage of sales than any 
other lottery. The 41% of sales returned to society in the UK compares to an average of 
26% for the top 100 lotteries in the world. Behind the UK, the next highest figure is 
40% for Westdeutsche Lotterie in Germany and the New Jersey Lottery in the US. The 
largest lotteries in the world in terms of total sales are Loterias y Apuestas del 
Estado in Spain and Lottomatica in Italy, who return 33% and 25% respectively.

The UK achievement is even more impressive given that of the top ten lotteries in the 
world (ranked by absolute returns to society), six can offer games that are prohibited 
in the UK. These include sports betting, ’quick draw’ Keno-type games and Video Lottery 
Terminals (VLTs), which are similar to amusement/slot machines. 

The study analysed the top 100 lotteries in the world (as ranked by total sales) across 
a total of 39 countries. Sales data was obtained from the 2006 La Fleur’s World Lottery 
Almanac and converted from local currency to sterling using the exchange rate at 31st 
December 2005 for each country.

La Fleur’s is the pre-eminent source of lottery information published by Terri La Fleur, 
who has over 25 years’ experience of reporting on the industry. Data on the proportion 
of sales returned to society was obtained from La Fleur’s and directly from 
international lottery operators. For the UK, the latest comparable figures are from 
Camelot (sales, payments to Good Causes and Government) and the Department for Culture 
Media and Sport (investment income).