The mysterious shadow economy around winning Oregon Lottery tickets

Last month, watchdog reporter Ted Sickinger published an in-depth article examining a loophole in the Oregon Lottery’s rules. In Oregon, it is perfectly legal to re-sell your winning lottery ticket at a discount, allowing the buyer to claim the prize.

Why would anyone do this? Well, if they wanted to avoid having the state seize part of their winnings for taxes or back child support, for example.

And why would the state allow this? Lottery officials told Sickinger they were aware of the practice of “discounting” and despite the fact other states have moved to close down similar schemes elsewhere nothing had been done in Oregon to prohibit the workaround.

Sickinger joined Editor Therese Bottomly on “Beat Check with The Oregonian” to talk about how he got onto the story and how he tracked down participants willing to talk with him. He also talked about reaction to his piece.

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