a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment by sounds_sound
sounds_sound  ·  4681 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: US Lottery highest amount in history.. $640M
I recently heard the lottery referred to as the idiot tax.




ecib  ·  4680 days ago  ·  link  ·  
It's totally not an idiot tax if you do it right :)

With these odds, spending $1 or $20,000 essentially doesn't make a difference. Your odds are just about zero. So the extra money spent past a dollar is basically a waste. But, we all know how fun it is to fantasize about what we'd do with all that money, and that for as bad as the odds are, there is still no way for that fantasy to ever come true unless you play. So basically, you spend a dollar not to try and win, but to totally amp up and enhance your fantasy daydream and make it that much more enjoyable since it could now "technically happen" with that $1 purchase.

That's worth a buck to me, every time, -a very fair deal imho.

mk  ·  4680 days ago  ·  link  ·  
Yeah, I guess the dream is worth a buck. Funny that the government runs these things. It's just a very clever tax.
mk  ·  4681 days ago  ·  link  ·  
It is totally an idiot tax.

That said, I was an idiot today. I know that I am not going to win it, but there's something about buying the right to imagine what you might do, even if it's for a day or two. I even played my new daughter's birthdate, because that's what my dad used to do.

Now video poker and slot machines... that is something I can't fathom. They aren't any fun at all, and the losing is so aggressive and guaranteed.