Feeling poor leads to increased lottery participation

[mjfrombuffalo[$]]

"When people are made to feel subjectively poor, they end up buying more lottery tickets which is somewhat perverse since every time you buy a lottery ticket, it's the equivalent of burning money," says researcher.

"People who run lotteries have a lot of knowledge. They know who buys what types of tickets, they know who their customers are and their advertising certainly plays on the hopes and aspirations of low-income individuals," Loewenstein said.

I would have said "preys on the hopes and aspirations of low-income individuals," but that's just me

[Prepoia[$]]

and me.

[JonSmith]

Well, someone wins, eventually. It 'could' be you.

[amykhar]

Deb, go easy on Jon when you reply to his post

(Deb is our resident statistics expert, Jon)

Amy

[frazzledspice]

I was shocked to read that a little less than 70% of lotto proceeds goes back to people in the form of prizes....

Whereas I've read that online casinos have payouts of 95% or so.....

In that case, you'd be likely to lose both times but you'd do a lot better in an online casino.

[magenta321]

All it takes is a dollar and a dream, baby.

[conradd]

amykhar said

Deb, go easy on Jon when you reply to his post

(Deb is our resident statistics expert, Jon)

Amy

I wish I had more time today, but I'll be back. In the meantime, one of my favorite Dilbert cartoons has Dogbert making the following offer: "I'm selling "value-added lottery" tickets. They're half price, but the chance of winning is only 1 in ten million less."

A gentleman walks up: "I'll take one...Hey, wait! This is yesterday's ticket."

Dogbert: "And your point is?"

Jon, calculate the chance of winning and then calculate the chance of losing. What does that tell you?

[jgibson2[$]]

I have to admit to occasionally buying a megamillions ticket when it gets upwards of 100 million for the prize. OTOH, I've also made many people stop talking to me about their lottery winnings by asking them how much they spend every day on the lottery and doing the math about how much further they'd be ahead if they just put that in the bank. I don't think they change their behavior, just stop talking to me.

[mjfrombuffalo[$]]

My 2-3 trips per week to Cananda to play Bingo ended when I started tracking my spent/earned ratio. Even with a $150 full card prize one night, the tracking showed I was only pacing what I spent for the year; once I saw I was slowly but steadily losing ground, the fun was gone.

[JonSmith]

amykhar said

Deb, go easy on Jon when you reply to his post

(Deb is our resident statistics expert, Jon)

Amy

LOL. I can take it.

I play the lottery anyway, even knowing the odds. It gives me a bit of hope, I guess.

[mtbat]

I do buy lottery tickets, not everyday-although the local state lotto runs some sort of drawing every freaking day except Sunday. Let me think-they do Cash 5 six days a week then the regular lotto and powerball two days a week. I don't go out of my way to buy a ticket, and I don't think it will solve all my problems. but I see people who buy a hundred dollars worth of lotto or powerball and think-wow, it must be nice to have that much extra money to just toss away.

the people who make the lotto tickets, and run the casinos know what they're doing, they're making a profit on the "what if's".... If someone wants to throw away their money-not my call, I do gamble, but rarely and with limits, I see people who go up the mountain to the casinos three times a week.. what fun is that?

[jgibson2[$]]

Some of the people buying large $$ amounts of powerball, megamillions, etc are buying them for groups. They've occasionally collected at work when the prize gets really large. Usually it's $5/person and 15-20 people will participate. Once, when the prize was over $300 million, our nurse manager joined in. She said that if her whole staff was leaving at once, she wouldn't be staying either.

Nope. Didn't win.

[drmomentum[$]]

I could play the lottery, but instead I'm just hoping to find a winning ticket on the ground sometime. It's much cheaper, and the chances aren't that much worse.

So, see, you can win if you don't play. And saving the money is yet another way of winning.

However, I am thankful that someone pays the state lottery. Oops, I meant "plays."



-JP

[jgibson2[$]]

Or as my brother-in-law says, Lottery - a tax on people who aren't very good at math. My rationale for occasionally playing is that it's cheaper than Starbucks and the return rate is higher.

[slick4591[$]]

I received my electric bill today. I think I need to buy a lottery ticket.

[theworm[$]]

what will is cost you in gas to drive to the store to buy your lottery ticket? Makes the odds worse.

[jgibson2[$]]

I don't think I'll bother this week. Our heat pump needed a new coil, but it was in warranty and didn't cost anything, so I feel rich.

[eris esoteric]

jgibson2 said

Lottery - a tax on people who aren't very good at math.

Well, that's nicer than the way *I* say it.

Sold lottery tickets at the store. Oddly enough, no one wanted to take me up on my offer to call them a loser for half the cost of whatever ticket they were buying.

[mjfrombuffalo[$]]

[wivabef]

I buy the a buck or two of tickets when its in the 100-200 million range, if I remember. People who spend money on lottery tickets all the time will also go to the casinos, the tracks and whatnot.

From writing obituaries, I can tell you a lot of peoples lives would be over if they didn't have casinos, the horses, bingo and the lottery... these are write up there in the hobbies category with "crabbing and going to Ocean City" in these parts.