Posted on 02/11/2015 2:49:21 PM PST by blam
Andy Kiersz
February 11, 2015
The Powerball lottery drawing for Wednesday evening has an estimated jackpot prize of $500 million.
While that's a huge amount of money, buying a ticket is still probably a losing proposition.
Consider the expected value
When trying to evaluate the outcome of a risky, probabilistic event like the lottery, one of the first things to look at is "expected value". The expected value of a randomly decided process is found by taking all of the possible outcomes of the process, multiplying each outcome by its probability, and adding all of these numbers up. This gives us a long-run average value for our random process.
Expected value is helpful for assessing gambling outcomes: If my expected value for playing the game, based on the cost of playing and the probabilities of winning different prizes, is positive, then in the long run, the game will make me money. If expected value is negative, then this game is a net loser for me.
(snip)
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
Someone here in soviet Red Hampshire matched the first five numbers and missed the ‘Powerball’ by ONE digit (’18’ instead of ‘19’). He’ll still $1 million for his troubles...
“That is correct from my understanding. Most, if not all, states allow someone to remain anonymous if the person has a compelling reason for anonymity. Without going into details, I have such a reason which I’m certain would be deemed compelling.”
You maybe correct about that as well as the trusts. The real issue is how can the lottery maintain credibility that it actually has paid off winners? I believe that is why remaining anonymous can be an issue. I also wonder if a court might find that winners must be disclosed under some variation of an open meetings statute? Who knows? BTW, I didn’t win last night.
Main reason a lottery winner shouldn’t remain anonymous:
An information-security director for a lottery vendor has been charged in a bizarre fraud case in which authorities say he purchased a lottery ticket at a Des Moines gas station in 2010 and enlisted the help of others to try to claim its $14.3 million prize...
...They also discovered Tipton rented a silver 2007 Ford Edge on Dec. 22, which matched the vehicle of the buyer of the winning lottery ticket...
I won last night ... I didn’t spend a dollar to have someone else reap the benefits. So you see, I won at least a dollar.
You are so, so correct. When I was 20 I disregarded that advice. When I was 30 I wised up. I’m looking at retirement now; I might have been ready a decade ago if I’d listened then.
Sounds about right.....nowadays.
Here's the deal for me....Why can't the Lottery Officials...check/confirm who you are. Give you the money and give you the anonymity..that you should have...IF that is what you want.
BTW, they caught that guy because the whole thing stunk to high heaven. Not a typical case...and not a "good reason".
FWIW-
“My boss was one of those “The lottery is a tax on people that are bad at math” guys... I told him at 180 million to 1 the odds were infinitely better than getting rich working for him.
My brother-in-law always went on about how most lotto winners were broke in a couple years... I told him that was because they gave money to their in-laws, and that I wouldn’t make that mistake”.
Nice retort
But here in MD, winners can stay anonymous. LOL. Like that would work with the big mouths in my family. Maybe I could buy their silence.
where are you in MD?
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