Ok we all know NPO’s get some leeway on gambling type events, raffles, bingo, etc. I have seen raffles for houses, cars, real money.
So is it hypothetically possible to have a large scale “lottery” could you hypothetically see a HS band fundraiser pull a multimillion dollar lottery?
Sure they have them out here in the bay area all the time. One Non-profit sells $100 tickets to win a megabuck house.
Infrastructure is needed to sell enough low-price tickets to get to a really big scale, like ticket terminals in every corner store.
At $100 a ticket you have to sell 10,000 tickets for $1M in gross revenue. To offer a million dollar prize and still have money left for the organization, you have to do, what, twice that? So now you have 50 band members selling 400 tickets each. I guess if you can get that many people to pony up for a $100 ticket it’s feasible, but most large-scale lotteries are more like $1-5.
Depends where you live. Many times the authorities just turn a blind eye to non-profit gambling, or it operates under tight restrictions. With that kind of money at stake a fundraiser would be subject to much more scrutiny. As mentioned by others it seems quite impractical also.