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 ...
I handed Thousands of Dollars to the Government in Taxes last Year. So far, I’m not a winner.
It took eight posts before you came along and spoke truth.
“I told him that was because they gave money to their in-laws, and that I wouldn’t make that mistake.”
Exactly. Which is why its a good thing I’m not one of your in-laws. ;-)
I get the Cash Value Option -payments over 30 years is not going to happen - so the jackpot becomes HALF.... then there is taxes, which is probably close to half
So I’d be looking at $125 million or so if I won and had the sole winning ticket.
If I win, I’m going to buy Brian Williams a Lie Detector.
"On the bright side, you'd be able to afford one."
You'd also need a private air force and navy to keep the baddies at bay.
What is being “sold” is a fiction, to collect more “taxes” from willing participants.
In addition to the feds taking 40% of all the “winnings”, the states take 50% or more of the bets off the top.
“I would not want to win a $500 Million lottery. Seriously.”
Okay. If you win, I’ll be happy to take that 500 million off your hands ;-)
Of course, there is nothing to prevent someone else from also getting the same winning number. That would cut your gross in half.
It would be kind of frustrating to blow $350,000,000 on tickets and then have to split the pot with some illegal alien who traded his Obama food stamps for a ticket.
I wanna High Point 10mm !!!! (Legal grenade)....
Lottery is a tax that people are willing to pay for a chance to have their lives ruined.
> It would cost you to $350,000,000 to buy every single number. After taxes, you would take the loss.
No, the $350 million would be gambling losses.
I’ll get you a Rossi in .475 Linebaugh.
According to Hillary, you'd be dead broke
It would cost a lot more than that. There are 59 white balls and 35 red balls. In total there are 21,026,821,200 possible outcomes (59*58*57*56*55*35). So the cost to cover all the possible draws is over $42 billion.
I like the way you think.
You have to include in the calculation the probability that other people might also purchase the winning number. The odds are not 100%, but with so many people participating, they are pretty high.
If one other person gets lucky, your investment is a loser. It gets worse if two other people get lucky.
There is also the problem that you cannot physically purchase every number.
It gives me a chance to dream for a while. I would be happy to win more than I paid, and thrilled with any prize that ends in “million.”
“Lotteries are a tax on the mathematically challenged.”
Seek help. ;)
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