And circulating around the base when I was there was a joke application form to live in Angus. It had questions about the number of broken appliances in your front yard, in how many different ways is your mother related to you etc.
Living the dream! When my husband and I are feeling flush, I buy the fancy cheese. 
I hate workplace lottery pools the most. You either have to participate (so you’re not the chump who doesn’t get a cut if they win), or you don’t participate (and you’re the chump who doesn’t get a cut if they win).
Cat Whisperer, I would jump out in front of the first available bus if I was asked to join a pool and didn’t and a big prize was won.
The guys who won the million didn’t have an organised pool going. I think it was a spur of the moment thing to buy some tickets one weekend as a group of shift workers, and lo and behold they won. I know of two people who were asked to go in and declined. But when the money was divided there were so many in the group the winnings per person amounted to little more than a years salary roughly. The group was nice enough to buy a lunch for everyone else in the building.
The guy who won the $20 million quit on the spot after discovering he won at work. A get together was planned for him at a local restaurant to say goodbye, and the cheap clown didn’t even buy a round for everyone :rolleyes:
It’s not true that nobody ever wins the lottery - one time I was in line behind a lady who had won money in a lottery! Three whole dollars. Woo-hoo. /sarcasm
How the fuck do you know that? Unless you’re a seriously powerful precognitive, or the guy who’s got that lottery fixed, the answer is: you don’t know that. Somebody’s going to win it, and that will be somebody who bought a ticket. You won’t.
Again: you don’t know that. Somebody *is *going to win that lottery. That person will be somebody who played that lottery. If I play it, there’s as good a chance I’ll win as anyone else. If you don’t play, you really won’t win.
Speaking for myself, I do just fine feeding myself and don’t need to be instructed from the height of your high horse. How I spend my dollar, or my ten dollars, is none of your goddamned business.
Speaking again for myself: playing the lottery doesn’t make someone a “fucking asshole”; giving people orders and shitting on their fun does.
I was referring to the government as assholes, not the ticket buyers.
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Have you won a lottery jackpot? The odds that the same trend will continue are as close to certain as anything in this world can reasonably be predicted. Your problem is that the OP and many of the rest of us understand math, you don’t. But please, go ahead and consider lottery tickets to be your retirement investment plan. It helps the rest of us reduce our tax burden. Go ahead, buy lottery tickets by the shovelful. What could possibly go wrong?
I always love the argument that nobody wins the lottery.
Starting with such an obvious falsehood doesn’t help the rest of the argument. If you’re looking to make an intelligent argument based on the odds, then do so, factually.
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you know jackshit about me, what I understand or what I don’t; you’re just some jerk making fun of me on the internet.
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Whatever your high school math teacher might’ve told you, the facts are this: somebody’s going to win that lottery, and it will be someone who bought a ticket. Nobody who didn’t play will win. If I buy in, I am just as likely to win as anyone else who played --if, to be sure, it wasn’t fixed. If you were taught otherwise, sorry, you were taught wrong --for all of your mockery and your “many of us” and your superior understanding.
If I buy a $2 powerball ticket, I am almost certainly wasting my money.
But here’s the thing. I’ve won plenty of small jackpots, so I know that over time, I won’t win nothing.
And here’s the rub: It’s my fucking money to do with as I please. I’ll waste my money my way, you’re free to keep wasting money on $6 coffees you could get for a dollar, or $1 bananas at the convenience store near your job instead of buying them by the bunch for 69 cents a pound or less. Or paying $9 for beer you could have at home for $2.
The REAL problem with the lottery and certain individuals is the gambling addiction. I can’t count how many old people I’ve seen dropping $60-80 at one shot on scratch-offs. THAT is stupid, and harmful.
This was in Iowa, and AFAIK Iowa has always done this kind of background check on anyone who wins more than $1,000.
There have been some winners who had creditors standing in line when they won, believe me. They were usually the type who ended up broke in short order anyway.
Talking like an asshole doesn’t help your cause.
I mean, I buy lottery tickets from time to time, because it’s fun. I am quite good at math. I know what the odds are of a single 6/49 number winning the jackpot; it’s a hair better than 14 million to 1, and I calculated that myself. (49 choose 6.) The odds of your $5 Lotto Max puchase hitting a jackpot is about 28.5 million to one; any given number is 85 million to one (49 choose 7) but you get three lines for your $5. I am perfectly aware how long those odds are. I am much, much, much likelier to die in a car accident this month than I am to win the lottery jackpot ever.
If you’re addicted, a hell of a lot. And that’s the real problem with government sponsored gambling; it’s too damn easy to get to for addicts. MY friend, the one I mentioned upthread who lost a fortune on scratch tickets, literally cannot walk into a convenience store or gas station. If he needs gas he pays at the pump. He is afraid of even being close to scratch tickets, and the damn things are sold everywhere.
If you just toss a couple of bucks at it now and then to enjoy the dream, absolutely nothing. What, you don’t spend money on ANYTHING frivolous? Really? I don’t believe that.
And coincidentally, just this morning, a new lady at work is starting up a lottery pool.
Fuck.
I’ve never been in one before, but as Cat Whisperer says, I’d be a chump not to join, just in case they do in fact win.
Fuck.
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Just tell the lottery pool people you’d rather spend the money on work-booze instead.
:D:D:D:D
Yeah, that would be quite the silly argument. Can you cite who has ever made that argument here?
Those aren’t terribly useful “facts”. You can win without buying a ticket if you get one as a gift or find one in the street, all of which are about as likely as the near-zero probability of winning a lottery with a ticket that you buy. Or you can have several million times greater odds by actually doing something sensible with your money. Most of us have experienced various kinds of financial gains in our lifetimes, sometimes unexpected, and in almost no case have they come from a lottery win. Reasonable people have some ability to understand that infinitesimally small probabilities should not be confused with plausible outcomes.
Very true. Buying a lottery ticket now and then for fun is no problem. Spending a measurable portion of one’s income on it in desperation is a psychological dysfunction.