Lottery

I recently parted ways with an employee. He has 3 kids with 3 different mothers. All of the kids are on welfare from what I observe. When I cleaned out his truck I found over 3000 dollars worth of used scratch tickets stuffed in the center console. I was told by a fellow employee his personal car was much worse. I figure he is supporting his kids after all.

Greetings,
Mr. b. "...supporting his kids after all." Supporting them with his scratch ticket/lottery winnings? Not very likely IMO.


Many moons ago I worked at a bingo hall and observed first hand the goings-on. For some it WAS entertainment. A chance to mingle with the "regulars". A social gathering, if you will BUT there were a number of attendees who spent on scratch and Keno cards. Hundreds of $$.



They also seemed to have a circuit. Venue A for 4 or 5 hours then Venue B for the midnight games. More of an addiction than an amusement, again IMO.

RT Firefly said:

Greetings,
Mr. b. "...supporting his kids after all." Supporting them with his scratch ticket/lottery winnings? Not very likely IMO.


Many moons ago I worked at a bingo hall and observed first hand the goings-on. For some it WAS entertainment. A chance to mingle with the "regulars". A social gathering, if you will BUT there were a number of attendees who spent on scratch and Keno cards. Hundreds of $$.



They also seemed to have a circuit. Venue A for 4 or 5 hours then Venue B for the midnight games. More of an addiction than an amusement, again IMO.

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Wifey B: All the participants are different and if we don't know them then judging them isn't probably a good idea.

Our main source of gambling is Poker but then we consider it just a game of skill, not gambling. IRS will probably question why we didn't report any gambling income for 2020. Duh. Only time we like being around drunks.

I won't do slot machines, tedious and time consuming and just lose. Not a roulette or craps player either. Will occasionally play blackjack, but mainly poker and not the machines, the rooms.

And lottery.

BandB said:

The vast majority do [know how bad the odds are] and it's more like entertainment to them.

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I have to disagree. I know a fair number of people who play the lottery. It is a minority of them who only play it for harmless entertainment. The majority have deluded themselves into thinking they have a meaningful possibility of winning.

Of course, if you specifically ask them about the odds of winning, they know that they are very small. But when they are going to buy the tickets, the back of their mind is telling them "this is going to be the time!"

It's much the same with gamblers. Some just do it now and then for a little fun. Others really convince themselves that they just need to play the slot-machines a few more times, and they will hit the big jackpot! (Though, of course, if they DO win big, that just convinces them to keep on going back and going back until they have lost it all again.)

Except for the addicted, and provided the promoter is a charity or uses the profits for community benefit, lotteries are no bad thing. Ours began in order to fund public hospitals, since then many lotteries are by private profit based promoters. Don`t overlook they give ticket holders a brief period of escape into thoughts of big winnings, a nice distraction from what is going on around the world.

denverd0n said:

I have to disagree. I know a fair number of people who play the lottery. It is a minority of them who only play it for harmless entertainment. The majority have deluded themselves into thinking they have a meaningful possibility of winning.

Of course, if you specifically ask them about the odds of winning, they know that they are very small. But when they are going to buy the tickets, the back of their mind is telling them "this is going to be the time!"

It's much the same with gamblers. Some just do it now and then for a little fun. Others really convince themselves that they just need to play the slot-machines a few more times, and they will hit the big jackpot! (Though, of course, if they DO win big, that just convinces them to keep on going back and going back until they have lost it all again.)

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Wifey B: Sounds exactly like fishermen to me. Spend hundreds of thousands to go try to catch the big one. Many come back in with nothing but continue to try. Others get small fish sort of like winning $5 on the lottery. Isn't fishing a form of gambling?

Lottery players, like fishermen, think this will be the time I win. Yes, some spend too much and lose money they can't afford to, but I stick to my assertion that is not the majority.

The idea that lotteries fund a specific purpose is preposterous. Unless education, for example, gets the profits, all of the profits, over and above levels of funding pre-lottery, it is all a sham. The fact is, money is a fungible commodity. Lottery money ends up in the general fund in one form or another.

BruceK said:

Except for the addicted, and provided the promoter is a charity or uses the profits for community benefit, lotteries are no bad thing. Ours began in order to fund public hospitals, since then many lotteries are by private profit based promoters. Don`t overlook they give ticket holders a brief period of escape into thoughts of big winnings, a nice distraction from what is going on around the world.

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catalinajack said:

The idea that lotteries fund a specific purpose is preposterous. Unless education, for example, gets the profits, all of the profits, over and above levels of funding pre-lottery, it is all a sham. The fact is, money is a fungible commodity. Lottery money ends up in the general fund in one form or another.

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Worse still,what if the unlikely recipient of hens teeth rare winnings were to spend any part of the ill gotten gains on the demon drink? I see it clearly now, no good can come of lotteries, win, draw or lose.

The Euro lotteries are a better deal, the taxes are removed before the winnings are issued so if you win a million , you get a million , not a check for a million stapled to an IRS notice of taxes due.

I did not say no good could come from lotteries. I was merely making the observation that the profits do not fund anything specific despite the representations made to the public to get them to approve them when some folks are not comfortable with the idea of government promoting gambling. I play the lottery on occasion. I come from a small town in Connecticut that was home to a state senator who introduced the first bill in the state (1960) to establish a state lottery. It was roundly defeated year-after-year on moral grounds. It was ultimately approved after a hard-sell, something about education. Tickets were first sold in 1972.

In the State of Maryland, proponents of casino gambling sold the public on a constitutional amendment to allow casinos at struggling race tracks in order to preserve that industry. Yup, you guessed it. One casino at a track that no longer runs races and three casinos located nowhere near a race track.

BruceK said:

Worse still,what if the unlikely recipient of hens teeth rare winnings were to spend any part of the ill gotten gains on the demon drink? I see it clearly now, no good can come of lotteries, win, draw or lose.

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Taxes are taxes, however disguised.

FF said:

The Euro lotteries are a better deal, the taxes are removed before the winnings are issued so if you win a million , you get a million , not a check for a million stapled to an IRS notice of taxes due.

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FF said:

The Euro lotteries are a better deal, the taxes are removed before the winnings are issued so if you win a million , you get a million , not a check for a million stapled to an IRS notice of taxes due.

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Yep, the real winners in U.S. lotteries are the IRS and Congress.

Greetings,
Mr. cj. "...something about education." 'Tis a pity none of the education $$ went to math (the odds) or reasoning skills (what are the odds?).

Congress, yes, the IRS, no. The IRS is just the collection agency. It gets no benefit one way or another.

Group9 said:

Yep, the real winners in U.S. lotteries are the IRS and Congress.

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catalinajack said:

The idea that lotteries fund a specific purpose is preposterous. Unless education, for example, gets the profits, all of the profits, over and above levels of funding pre-lottery, it is all a sham. The fact is, money is a fungible commodity. Lottery money ends up in the general fund in one form or another.

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Exactly. I remember when Florida first introduced their lottery. It was called The Florida Education Lottery. The money went into The Florida Education Lottery Fund. But the small print said that the legislature could spend the money in any way they wanted. For every single dollar of the lottery money that they spent on education, they REDUCED by a dollar the money spent on education from the general fund. They did NOT increase the amount being spent on education, they just moved it around.


The whole thing was (is) a great, big sham! And that's about the nicest word that you can use for it!

About 30 years ago, the State Govt introduced a "3 by 3" fuel tax. 3c a litre, for a fixed period of 3 years, to cover some rural roadworks.
The "3 years" proved highly elastic. We still have it.
Then there`s the "imported luxury car tax", to protect local manufacturers of higher end cars against imports. We no longer build any cars, luxury or not, in Australia. The tax remains in force.

Governments get very attached to the tax teat.

The "gas taxes"were claimed to fix roads and bridges , which instantly morphed to a transportation tax to bail out unused air ports in congressional towns , and commuter railroads .

catalinajack said:

Congress, yes, the IRS, no. The IRS is just the collection agency. It gets no benefit one way or another.

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It adds to how much they collect, which directly relates to how much of a budget increase they get.

That's about the only performance indicator the IRS has to present to Congress.

Greetings,
A Youper goes into Wallymart to buy some condoms (on sale). The cashier says "That'll be $8+tax." The fella says "Tax? I thought they stayed on by themselves."

boathealer said:

Let's see, $2 to have a 1:14-million chance to win half a BILLION dollars?!?!

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Well, I can see you people aren't statisticians. If it costs $2 for a 1 :14-million chance, then take out a loan and buy 14-million tickets for $28 million. Then you have a 1 : 1 chance of making half a billion for only $28 million.

Jeez, you'd think a bunch of smart folks like you would have figured that out...I would do it, but I don't believe in gambling.

Group9 said:

It adds to how much they collect, which directly relates to how much of a budget increase they get.

That's about the only performance indicator the IRS has to present to Congress.

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I don’t believe the IRS has had a budget increase in over a decade, only budget cuts. The number of auditors has dropped every year. With fewer returns being checked the amount of fraud, evasion and non-payment has soared.

The IRS budget is NOT dependent on how much it collects. How do I know? Before I retired I worked at a high level for the chief IRS budget officer.

Group9 said:

It adds to how much they collect, which directly relates to how much of a budget increase they get.

That's about the only performance indicator the IRS has to present to Congress.

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Bkay said:

Well, I can see you people aren't statisticians. If it costs $2 for a 1 :14-million chance, then take out a loan and buy 14-million tickets for $28 million. Then you have a 1 : 1 chance of making half a billion for only $28 million.

Jeez, you'd think a bunch of smart folks like you would have figured that out...I would do it, but I don't believe in gambling.

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Well, if we're going to get all analytical about it, it's even worse than that since there is no fixed number of tickets sold. They allow unlimited duplicate numbers to be sold which lowers your odds of winning and means you may have to divide the winnings with X number of others. In my mind the lottery is almost purely a recreational activity with a likelihood of payoff approaching zero. Kind of like boating.

kthoennes said:

In my mind the lottery is [STRIKE]almost[/STRIKE] purely a recreational activity with a likelihood of payoff approaching zero. Kind of like boating.

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Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner! (With one, minor correction.)

I see somebody won the Powerball -- $730 million. Rats. That means I'll have to use Mega Millions winnings instead to buy the Nordie.

kthoennes said:

I see somebody won the Powerball -- $730 million. Rats. That means I'll have to use Mega Millions winnings instead to buy the Nordie.

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Too bad, shipmate, I've already got the Golden Wonka Bar, but I'll save you a bunk.

damn.

Anyone have the numbers for how much the gov made by running this lottery/

FF said:

Anyone have the numbers for how much the gov made by running this lottery/

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About 30% goes to governments. After all is said and done they make about $30 billion a year. A lot or not? Depends. For most states only about 1% of their total revenues but also for many it's more than their revenues from Corporate Income Taxes, so it's perspective. The vast majority goes to education but that doesn't really mean education has more money than they otherwise would.

One other piece of the equation. On a billion dollar win in Maryland with a lump sum of perhaps $700 million, then the state of Maryland would get 5.75% and the IRS would then get 37% of the balance. So $40 million to Maryland and $244 million to the Federal government. So, ultimately, you combine this with the upfront money to the states and the government gets over 50% of all money spent with 30% upfront and 20% on the backend.

The lottery is a lot of things. It's gambling. It's entertainment. It's fun. It's bad for those who overspend. But it's a very sizable voluntary tax too. It also, like most gambling, can change lives both favorably and unfavorably. There have been a lot of very happy winners who spent their money wisely and protected themselves while giving to causes important to them. There have also been winners totally ill equipped to deal with large sums of money, not seeking or following advice of professionals, plagued by greedy family and friends, throwing huge sums away in record time, almost like the movie in which you have to get rid of a million dollars in a day or something. I'm sure many would broadcast it anyway, but I hate that most states require the winner to allow their name to be made public. I know initially that was so people would believe someone really won, but it sets up such a target. It's the worst thing possible to do to a big winner.

Also, the odds of winning something, not the jackpot, is 1 in 24.9.