Divide and Conquer: Meet the Lottery Titans

ENVELOPED in neon lights, murmuring crowds and the tinny melody of computerized games, a convention center showroom here bears the trappings of a Las Vegas casino. But the players, mostly state employees sporting suits and name tags, haven’t come to this annual expo to gamble. Instead, they are sampling the wares of one of government’s biggest cash cows: lotteries, which rang up about $202 billion in sales last year in the United States and overseas.