earn money through lottery (no card info necessary)

[Ephemeral]

When speaking of odds and metrics there is little value in looking at exceptions, you look at the 'big picture'. And the 'big picture' is was that there were 100 million buyers for 1.5 billion tickets. Very few people did what you say (spend $2), obviously those people we saw standing in those lines were not there to buy a single ticket. There were many reports of people spending thousands of dollars on tickets. The demographics of tickets buyers is also meaningful, the lower you are on the income scale the more likely you are to spend money on a chance to win something you have virtually no chance to win.

The money spent on this lottery could have filled the gas tanks of 685,000 households for an entire year. Same amount of money would have paid to put 2.4 million iPads in the hands of school children. Only approximately 50% of the total sales actually goes to the jackpot and about 20% goes to the cost of running the lottery. None of this can be considered 'productivity', none of it helps the GNP and our standing in the world economy. It is a state-sponsored industry with no positive end game. IMO, Americans should be smarter than this.
eph

[kthx]

I am sure you also buy health insurance and car insurance even though you are probably young and healthy and also a good driver so have a very slim chance of getting sick or getting into a car accident. Do you also buy renters or house insurance in the case your house or apartment is burglarized or burns down? Welcome to life these days, most people are mandated by the government (in your case I know this to be true) to buy lottery tickets in one way or another. They just call it by other names.

[Zeebu]

i spent 9 dollars on tickets because i won 3 dollars per game from poker in my bowling league

[Zeebu]

i didnt win

[Supreme]

Bummer.

It's a thing of hope eph, what if..

[kthx]

I am sure some of it was hope but I have no doubt that the record number of sales was a more social event than a im spending my last 20 dollars that I need to buy food to buy lottery tickets and hope I win kind of thing, even though I am sure that did happen. Like I said, all my friends and families offices and companies all did like 2-10 dollar lottery pools and stuff.

[kthx]

And mainly the reason why I posted in here is because Eph is retarded apparently which annoys me although that may be the point of him making the post to begin with.

[Supreme]

Yeah ok, you've got a point

[vaped]

I made money off the Megamillions.

Sold quite a few tickets all week and then spaced out buying my own. Pretty sure I came out ahead though.

[Xog]

Very few people did what you say (spend $2), obviously those people we saw standing in those lines were not there to buy a single ticket.

Lottery pools. Seriously.

Co-workers from hundreds of thousands of companies in the major cities in the US, also schools, social groups, and friends often group up with eachother for a better chance to win.

Gather 25 co-workers, have each pitch in $2, bam you have 50 picks. If 1 pick wins, the winnings are split among everyone. I do this roughly once a month, but since the jackpot was so high recently, I did it every day for 5 days (overall spent $10, got 250 picks, won $300 (150 on two days) throughout the week, $12 given to everyone overall, I profited $2).

Also, comparing gas prices to spending money on lotto is ridiculous. I don't own a car, but gassing up an SUV or minivan is like $50 or more around here. To have to do that every other day or so is really expensive. Spending $2 every now and then on a chance to win a shitload of money is way different.

I've heard of lawyers in the firm I work for who get together and throw in $100 each or more for each pool. That's a SHITLOAD of picks.

[T3l Ca7]

IMO, Americans should be smarter than this.

Eph, your faith in American population is astonishing.

Americans are of normal intelligence and human are generally design to be not very bright. That is why well educated, highly intelligent people tend to breed much less than their ignorant or dumber counterparts.

IMO, 20 years prior to GFC, the whole investment banking industry was like gambling. The only people who were certain they would be making money were the insider traders, management (leeches) and brokers (sales people of the financial market).

The cockroaches will be a more successful special if there is a nuclear war. And if the earth is hit by an asteroid the size of 1/10 of the moon then the species likely to survive are the viruses.

If human (and in your case, the Americans) are so intellutually superior, why have we not even landed on another earth like planet yet? IMO before that happens, human really have no advantage over any other specie on the face of earth.

[Soup du Jour]

exceptional post

[Downfall]

I think kthx is the type of person that eph is referring to in his posts."its only 2 dollars doesnt matter".

Eph compared lottery tickets and gas prices I think because you don't just go out and buy 1 or 2 tickets/litres so when it is those same people that are complaining about gas.... :/

Better yet, save up that lottery money and go use it at the casino for better odds

[Ephemeral]

I was incredibly insulted by kthx post. ‘Retarded’?!? THAT is the best troll he could come up with? Pfft. Where is the usual rapier-like dry wit wrapped in creative muses that he affords to others? But for me the best he has is ‘retarded’? Wow, I was really expecting better from him. I DESERVE a better troll than that, I am a vet in this community! LOL

Xog, I know that you make a living being close to lawyers, but I don’t think that they should be held up as a potential solution. You’re saying that a solution is for lottery players simply need to buy tickets in pools much like one of the current winners did, or did she? The lawyers are already lining up for this, she says that, yes she was in a pool but the winning ticket happened to be a ticket she bought outside the pool.
No, lawyers are just another aspect of a deteriorating US economy where we have added endless layers of non-productive leeching upon each other. My point was that US has to be smarter than building an economy that has little productivity of real goods and services. The manufacture of durable goods and its related innovation of new technologies has left this country. Without it we are a country of parasites feeding upon each other, dividing up smaller and smaller pieces of an economy that is a house of cards built upon no real productivity. The lottery (i.e. gambling) and legal industries epitomize this issue.
eph

[kthx]

If you had made a better point originally or actually argued any of the obvious points I made to you comparing the lottery to any type of insurance maybe I would have bothered trolling well, until then, retarded works.