Earliest National Day Celebration Events

In case you ever wanted to know which countries celebrate the earliest events in their national holiday, here is a list for those countries commemorating events which occurred before 1800 (source mostly Wikipedia).

Year	Country	Celebrated Event
660 BC	Japan	Coronation Day First Emperor Jimmu
301	San Marino	Independence from the Roman Empire
461	Ireland	Death of St. Patrick
1291	Switzerland	Alliance against the Holy Roman Empire
1492	Spain	Columbus Discovers America
1523	Sweden	Election of Gustav Vasa as King of Sweden
1580	Portugal	Death of National Poet Luís de Camões
1776	United States	Declaration of Independence from Great Britain
1788	Australia	Founding of Sydney
1789	France	Storming of the Bastille
1791	Poland	Constitution of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth

The list does not include sub-national territories where Scotland (70), England (303), Wales (589), Faroe Islands (1030), Minorca (1287), Catalonia (1714) and Sardinia (1794) also celebrate events before 1800.

Apologies if I have missed any event in the above list.

Chilean Lottery (Polla) Numbers for 2011

We looked at the financial numbers for 2011 and 2010 for Polla Chilena, one of the two official lotteries in Chile.

The basic numbers look as follows (in thousand CLP):

* Lottery Revenues can be categorized in the various games as follows (most of the revenues are from traditional lotto):

** From the Payouts there is a 2% fee going to the Handling Agent and a 15% tax on lottery winnings.

*** The Various Beneficiaries are detailed as follows

This gives the following overview on where the revenues go (handling agent fee added to administration cost, all taxes and state beneficiary summed up):

The following comments can be made when comparing these metrics to other lotteries:

• low winner payout (typically in the 40-50% range)
• high administration cost (normally less than 10%)
• high take by the state (normally less than 20%, if that)
• very low distribution to good causes (even when including the amount given to the "Instituto Nacional del Deporte", normally above 30%)

Reader comments as always welcome.