&gt;  what they really did is outsource the management to a private company.<p>&gt; Those lotteries are not privatized in the sense of opening it up to competition.<p>Privatization typically refers to the management, not to competition. For example, we say that electricity is privatized in NYC because it is managed by a (highly regulated) publicly traded company, even though there is no competition[0].<p>[0] There is now competition for the supply (though not delivery) via ESCOs, but that is a very recent move.