Scratch-off tickets turn into a $764m pot of gold

The numbers from the first quarter of this fiscal year are dire: State revenues missed the mark by $143 million. Sales tax figures plummeted $24 million from a year ago because people are buying less. The yo-yoing Dow Jones industrial average took a nose dive.

But lottery ticket sales? Those jumped by $14.5 million in Massachusetts the last three months.

"People are looking for extra cash," said the Rev. Richard McGowan, a professor of economics at Boston College who wrote a book about state lotteries. "The $20 instant lottery tickets give a pretty good rate of return. You can sit and dream for $20 that you might win a million."

Lottery sales surged 1.3 percent from July 1 through Sept. 27 compared with last year, when consumers spent a record $4.7 billion. Over the last three months, that is $764 million on scratch-off tickets alone.

In September, lottery officials unveiled a third $20 ticket - the Billion Dollar Bonanza. The first $1 million prize was won yesterday by a Roslindale couple who operates a bakery that had suffered its worst financial year to date, said Mark J. Cavanagh, director of the state lottery.

The games are cheap entertainment at a time when gas is prohibitively expensive and pricey diversions are out of the question, Cavanagh said.

"They see a ticket and they think, 'Here's my shot.' "