Pennsylvania Lottery has announced its results for FY2021, revealing it has generated a record profit of $1.3bn.
For the tenth successive year, the lottery has raised over $1bn for charitable causes across the state for senior programs, which include property tax and rent rebates, free and reduced-fare transportation, and prescription assistance.
The success of the year is attributed to record sales of $5.3bn in traditional games, which include scratch-off tickets and draw games, such as Powerball and Mega Millions.
Scratch-off games were by far the largest source of sales, contributing 70% of the lottery’s total sales. Its sales reached $3.2bn across the fiscal year, a 17% increase on the previous year.
Furthermore, the lottery set another sales record by achieving around $887m in online sales, representing an improvement of $155.7m, or 21%, from the previous year.
The lottery’s Executive Director, Drew Svitko, commented: “We are extremely proud that we kept funds flowing to programs that benefit older Pennsylvanians during a year when many sorely needed this assistance.
“Our team is very passionate about our mission of responsibly generating funds for our commonwealth’s older residents. We are hard at work to make sure that we keep this momentum going and build on this success.”
Pennsylvania Lottery uses 9,600 retailers across the state, many of which are family-run stores. These retailers earned $329.1m in sales commissions, an increase of $71.6m from the previous fiscal year.