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Thursday, Feb. 6, 2025

Fact brief: Did the Texas Lottery start as a way to help fund public schools?

Jacob Sanchez, Fort Worth Report
yes

The Texas Legislature established the Texas Lottery in 1991 as a way to add significant new revenue to the state budget.

Since its 1992 launch, the Texas Lottery has generated more than $40 billion in revenue for the state government. More than $34 billion has been directed toward public education.

Annually, nearly 68% of Texas Lottery dollars were used for prizes paid, while almost 24% was directed toward the state’s school fund.

During the 2024 fiscal year, the Texas Lottery transferred around $2 billion to the state’s school fund.

The lottery, however, was never intended to fully fund public education. In a 2015 interview, Texas Lottery Executive Director Gary Grief told the Texas comptroller’s Fiscal Notes publication that the state has dealt with a “misunderstanding” about his agency’s role in funding education.

“Despite the perception problem we continue to deal with — it was never meant to be a panacea,” he said.

See a full discussion of this at Fort Worth Report

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Fact briefs are bite-sized, well-sourced explanations that offer clear "yes" or "no" answers to questions, confusions, and unsupported claims circulating online. They rely on publicly available data and documents, often from the original source. Fact briefs are written and published by Gigafact contributor publications.

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