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Why buying lottery tickets is a bad investment

Today there are hundreds of lotteries worldwide, which all have millions of people playing them every day. To the winner it can mean the difference between working for the rest of their life and living in luxury as a multi millionaire. But to those who don't win it is a daily waste of money that they most likely aren't ever going to get back. Most of those people know fairly certainly that they will probably never win any substantial amount of money from playing the lottery, but do so anyway. Although there are a small percentage who see buying lottery tickets as an investment, thinking that sooner or later they will win for sure, and when they do it will make all the money they have spent worthwhile.

What people tend to forget is that lotteries are designed to make the people running them millions of dollars, and not to help out everyone who plays them. What they also tend to forget is that the chances of them realistically winning are one in sometimes 100 million, meaning that on average it will take them several thousand years to win the jackpot. You have a much better chance in fact of being struck by lightning or being killed by a herd of stampeding donkeys than you do of ever winning the lottery, and yet millions of people still persist.

We have all been in a store behind someone who holds us up with their multitude of different lottery tickets that they buy every day. Some people literally spend all their money on playing the lottery, and will do it for years on end, which in my opinion defeats the objective. They stop themselves being able to afford luxuries and nice things, so that they can win money to do just that. If they only stopped playing the lottery they could probably afford a lot more of the things that they wanted.

A lot of people forget that the lottery is still a form of gambling as well. Even people who have gambling problems or who wouldn't dream of gambling normally perceive the lottery as different because of the impersonal and widespread nature of how it is played. If the lottery consisted of putting a dollar into a machine and then being told there and then you haven't won then it wouldn't be as popular.

I have friends and relatives for example who spend $5 every single day on various lotteries. That might not sound like much on the day, but it quickly adds up, approximately $1825 every year wasted. If there is two of them both playing the lottery then that becomes $3650 and so on. And if you look at that over time then


Below are the top articles rated and ranked by Helium members on:

Why buying lottery tickets is a bad investment

  • 1 of 7

    by Scott Heritage

    Today there are hundreds of lotteries worldwide, which all have millions of people playing them every day. To the win... read more

  • 2 of 7

    by Excalibur Snape

    It seams that no matter how much money you invest in lottery tickets you barley break even I mean you buy a five doll... read more

  • 3 of 7

    by Morgan Drake Eckstein

    There are many people who buy lottery tickets every week. And for the most part, no matter whether it is a scratch ga... read more

  • 4 of 7

    by Grey Lady

    Anyone purchasing a lottery ticket as a personal investment other than as the opportunity to play a game is indeed ma... read more

  • 5 of 7

    by Bradley Beecher

    Lottery tickets and the word investment do not belong in the same sentence. Shooting craps, playing blackjack, baccar... read more

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Why buying lottery tickets is a bad investment

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