Where does my money go?

The Pennsylvania Lottery was established by the Legislature in 1971. The purpose of creating the Lottery was, and remains, to generate funds to benefit programs for the Commonwealth's older residents.

Since 1972, when its first game went on sale, the Pennsylvania Lottery has contributed more than $19.2 billion to a wide variety of programs, including:

• Property Tax/Rent Rebate, administered by the Department of Revenue.
• Mass Transit Program for older residents, administered by the Department of Transportation.
• PACE, PACENET and now PACE Plus Medicare, administered by the Department of Aging. These constitute the nation's most comprehensive prescription program for older adults.
• Long-Term Care Services administered by the Department of Public Welfare.
• The 52 Area Agencies on Aging throughout the Commonwealth, comprising more than 600 full- and part-time senior community centers.

The Pennsylvania Lottery remains the only lottery in the nation that exclusively targets all of its proceeds to programs for older residents. In fiscal year 2008-2009, the Lottery had sales of more than $3.08 billion; contributions to programs for older Pennsylvanians totaled more than $910 million.

By law, the Pennsylvania Lottery must contribute at least 27 cents of each dollar earned to programs and 40 cents of each dollar to players in the form of prize money. In fiscal year 2008-2009,  the Lottery contributed about 30 cents of each dollar to programs for older residents, while about 60 cents of each dollar was returned to players in the form of prize money. 

As an agency of state government, the Pennsylvania Lottery is a successful enterprise of which all Pennsylvanians can be proud.