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Post by AYC on Jan 11, 2016 23:55:29 GMT
www.calottery.com/play/draw-games/powerballThis is insane. I work at a gas station and I've probably sold $1000 worth of lottery tickets just by myself. I bought one for the Saturday and upcoming Wednesday drawing just for the hell of it. My thoughts on Powerball, and the lottery in general, reposted from Facebook:
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Post by MinnesotaNationalist on Jan 12, 2016 0:10:02 GMT
Maybe I should go buy one as well... Eh, I think I might be to young to actually be allowed to play...
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Post by AYC on Jan 12, 2016 0:18:32 GMT
Maybe I should go buy one as well... Eh, I think I might be to young to actually be allowed to play... It's 18 in almost every state; Iowa, Louisiana, and Arizona are 21+ and Nebraska is 19, for some reason.
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Post by Jasen777 on Jan 12, 2016 0:22:33 GMT
I willing to chip in $2 to make some random person ridiculously rich. Actually there's a good chance there'll be multiple winners, so it could make more than one person ridiculously rich.
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Post by MinnesotaNationalist on Jan 12, 2016 2:36:11 GMT
Maybe I should go buy one as well... Eh, I think I might be to young to actually be allowed to play... It's 18 in almost every state; Iowa, Louisiana, and Arizona are 21+ and Nebraska is 19, for some reason. Hm, if that's the case I'll do it. Who knows, maybe I'll win
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Post by orvillethird on Jan 12, 2016 3:00:22 GMT
If someone wins, can they lend me a few thousand to help get a new place and pay for college?
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Post by ToixStory on Jan 12, 2016 3:07:41 GMT
Honestly, at this point I'd be afraid to win. Afraid that someone would just kill me for the money.
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zar
New Member
Posts: 13
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Post by zar on Jan 12, 2016 3:24:41 GMT
I will stoop down to the level of the vile utilitarians, but it shall be to lead prisoners out of the cave of ignorance. Let us assume that utility has a linear correlation with money ($2 gives twice as much enjoy as $1, the same with $4 and $2, etc).
We know the following. A power ball ticket costs $2, there is a 1 in 292 million chance of winning, and the gross sum of the winnings is $1.3 billion.
Let us also assume that the winner follows the most common advice given and takes the lump sum. This reduces the winnings to $806 million.
The government deservedly gets a significant part of the winnings for upholding it's end of the social contract. This leaves the net sum to be $486 million.
We can now use some simplified decision theory to see if the $2 'investment' is worth it.
1 over 292 million multiplied by 486 million equates to about 1.66.
The cost of the ticket is $2 and it is required in order to play.
The expected utility is then 1.662-2, which equals -0.33.
Thus, if one accepts all the premises and the player is considered to be rational, the choice that they should make is simply not to play.
However this hedonistic argument does not consider the damage done to a society. When people who are mostly of the producer class waste their time on frivolities such as lotteries, then a society cannot possibly be just.
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Post by rinkou on Jan 12, 2016 4:05:07 GMT
It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.
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Post by orvillethird on Jan 12, 2016 5:22:38 GMT
I played the lottery once on vacation in Tennessee. I spent $5 and got back $3, just to say I had done it once. If my luck on lotteries is as good as when I offer to bet on politics...I likely will lose money. OTOH, I have won several dollars from abandoned lottery tickets. I may also, once I get organized, play a little game from my state's lottery and anti-litter program. Mail in 10 used lottery tickets, you get entered into a drawing to win $50.
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Post by lordroel on Jan 12, 2016 20:19:00 GMT
You probably have to be a US citizen to compete, otherwise i would bought me self.
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Post by tardis218 on Jan 12, 2016 21:14:22 GMT
Honestly, at this point I'd be afraid to win. Afraid that someone would just kill me for the money. Our family was talking about this at dinner a few night ago. This was the night before my dad bought some tickets and basically the consensus with everybody in the house is that you don't tell *anyone*. You win and place it in an off shore banking account. That way, people would never, ever know. My dad was saying how he would put his brother down in Caracas in charge of handling it. (or something similar to that) To me, that's still a no-no. In my eyes nobody but the winners (my mom, my dad, my brothers, and I) would know about it.
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Post by Jasen777 on Jan 12, 2016 21:21:16 GMT
You probably have to be a US citizen to compete, otherwise i would bought me self. Actually, you don't have to be.
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Post by orvillethird on Jan 12, 2016 21:41:36 GMT
Honestly, at this point I'd be afraid to win. Afraid that someone would just kill me for the money. Our family was talking about this at dinner a few night ago. This was the night before my dad bought some tickets and basically the consensus with everybody in the house is that you don't tell *anyone*. You win and place it in an off shore banking account. That way, people would never, ever know. My dad was saying how he would put his brother down in Caracas in charge of handling it. (or something similar to that) To me, that's still a no-no. In my eyes nobody but the winners (my mom, my dad, my brothers, and I) would know about it. The problem is that the lottery will announce who won, I think...
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Post by AYC on Jan 12, 2016 21:42:58 GMT
Our family was talking about this at dinner a few night ago. This was the night before my dad bought some tickets and basically the consensus with everybody in the house is that you don't tell *anyone*. You win and place it in an off shore banking account. That way, people would never, ever know. My dad was saying how he would put his brother down in Caracas in charge of handling it. (or something similar to that) To me, that's still a no-no. In my eyes nobody but the winners (my mom, my dad, my brothers, and I) would know about it. The problem is that the lottery will announce who won, I think... States differ on this; some allow you to collect anonymously, others require a public declaration.
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Post by tardis218 on Jan 12, 2016 22:28:28 GMT
Our family was talking about this at dinner a few night ago. This was the night before my dad bought some tickets and basically the consensus with everybody in the house is that you don't tell *anyone*. You win and place it in an off shore banking account. That way, people would never, ever know. My dad was saying how he would put his brother down in Caracas in charge of handling it. (or something similar to that) To me, that's still a no-no. In my eyes nobody but the winners (my mom, my dad, my brothers, and I) would know about it. The problem is that the lottery will announce who won, I think... IIRC here in Maryland you can collect it anonymously?
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