You see my wife and I are educated, professionals with an upper-middle class life. We almost never bothered with lottery tickets because mathematically it made no sense to us, and at least here in America, I thought that only poor people seemed to buy them. Then, in November 2011, I heard how the jackpot went to three asset managers based in Greenwich, Connecticut. I wondered if three brilliant and filthy rich dudes buy lottery tickets, there is something wrong with my thinking. It was then that we started to buy lottery tickets, though, we have yet to win anything except a buck or two here and there.
The important thing to remember is that if you are as financially comfortable as I am, $2 spent on PowerBall or $1 spent on MegaMillions when the potential reward is tens or hundreds of millions of dollars is worth spending. I don't buy every week, and often miss even when the jack-pot is enormous, but if the prize is going to be huge and I happen to be pumping gas, I will buy it. In other words, I might spend at the most $30 a year but it does give me a remote chance that I might win something big. As they say, "You don't win if you don't play." Plus, it has some entertainment value because it lets me fantasize, and the cost for doing so is less than what I might pay for a cappuccino. Needless to add that if your income is so low that $30 is a lot of money for you (the thing is that a lot of low-income folks spend a lot more on lottery and gambling in the desperate hope that they might get rick and all their money problems will go away), then, you are better off not buying lottery tickets. The probability is so low that most likely many of us win nothing in our lifetimes (my wife's mother religiously bought lottery tickets and never won nothing) but it is a good return in its value as entertainment and a remote possibility of a huge reward.
The important thing to remember is that if you are as financially comfortable as I am, $2 spent on PowerBall or $1 spent on MegaMillions when the potential reward is tens or hundreds of millions of dollars is worth spending. I don't buy every week, and often miss even when the jack-pot is enormous, but if the prize is going to be huge and I happen to be pumping gas, I will buy it. In other words, I might spend at the most $30 a year but it does give me a remote chance that I might win something big. As they say, "You don't win if you don't play." Plus, it has some entertainment value because it lets me fantasize, and the cost for doing so is less than what I might pay for a cappuccino. Needless to add that if your income is so low that $30 is a lot of money for you (the thing is that a lot of low-income folks spend a lot more on lottery and gambling in the desperate hope that they might get rick and all their money problems will go away), then, you are better off not buying lottery tickets. The probability is so low that most likely many of us win nothing in our lifetimes (my wife's mother religiously bought lottery tickets and never won nothing) but it is a good return in its value as entertainment and a remote possibility of a huge reward.