Tag: #LotteryHistory

The Lottery Frenzy – Part 2 – Truths, Myths, Stories, Humor & A Dose of Reality

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Tis the season to start dreamin’……But don’t quit your day job just yet. 

You’ve Heard it Said Before  – “You Can’t Win If You Don’t Play”  How about some other similar sayings, like:

“You Can’t Win If You Don’t Enter” (Still waiting for the balloons & GIGANTIC Check!)

“You Can’t Sit If You Want to be Fit” (True! I’m glad I found that saying sitting in my recliner!)

“(If) You Can’t Say Something Nice, Don’t say ANYTHING AT ALL”

“You Can’t Complain If You Don’t Vote” (Just think – If we had a $1 National Complaint Jar, We’d turn that deficit around in no time!)

poor-t-rex_o_177370

“You Can’t Make Your Bed If You’re a Tyrannosaurus Rex”(Ok, that’s kinda off track, but pretty funny)

Let the FRENZY continue! Part 2 of today’s NETG Lottery craziness reminds us of the reality of betting the lottery.  If you want to read the first post, click here for POWERBALL Payoffs, A Little History, & A Little Bit of Humor.

Here are some truths about Mega Lotteries:images (1)

  • 75% of Jackpot winners used Quick Picks for their numbers.
  • The four winning-est Powerball Numbers are 26, 41, 22, 16
  • The odds are so large that even buying every number combination at $2 a ticket would cost you $584 million.  Sounds like a profit, right.  After taxes, you’ll still owe millions.
  • Lottery results are completely random, so no one can control the outcome. It is impossible to predict a number beyond its overall probability of appearing among the winning numbers. A random guess has just as much chance at winning as playing birthdays, anniversary dates, or any personal system. Players can’t control lottery outcomes by using various methods to forecast winning numbers – if so, would it be over $800,000,000?
  • The rules were changed on October 7, 2015 to make the jackpot harder to hit, and thus grow larger jackpots. The previous jackpot probability was 1 in 175.2 million. It is now 1 in 292.2 million.
  • Buying more tickets does not increase your chances.  Each ticket should be considered like one play on a slot machine – one event. THE ODDS DON’T CHANGE! YOU DON’T HAVE A BETTER CHANCE IF MORE OR LESS PEOPLE BUY TICKETS, OR WHATEVER THE JACKPOT IS!

WHAT ARE YOUR CHANCES – REALLY?

While it is true – “You Can’t Win If You Don’t Play,” what chances do you have to win? You have a better chance of the following instead of winning the jackpot:

1. Dying from an asteroid strike: 1 in 74,817,414

2. Getting killed by a terrorist act in the United States: 1 in 10,000,000

3. Getting murdered during a trip to the Grand Canyon: 1 in 8,156,000

4. Dying from chronic constipation: 1 in 2,215,900

5. Becoming a movie star: 1 in 1,505,000

6. Getting struck by lightning: 1 in 1,101,000

7. Birthing identical quadruplets – Odds: 13,000,000 to 1

8. Becoming an astronaut – Odds: 12,100,000 to 1

9. Getting a royal flush in a first hand of poker – Odds: 649,740 to 1

10. Finding a four leaf clover – Odds: 10,000 to 1

 

LOTTERY Myths and Facts

Myth: There are “hot numbers” that are drawn more often than others.
Fact: Lottery draws are completely random, so there are no hot numbers. Every number has an equal chance of being drawn, so every set of lottery numbers has the same chance of winning.

Myth: “Fresh” or newly arrived tickets are luckier than tickets from a previous week.
Fact: The probability of purchasing a winning ticket is the same over the lifespan of a lottery game. Unsold tickets from a previous week have the same chance of containing a winning ticket as newly delivered tickets.

Myth: Players can control lottery outcomes by using various methods to forecast winning numbers.
Fact: Lottery results are completely random, so no one can control the outcome. It is impossible to predict a number beyond its overall probability of appearing among the winning numbers. A random guess has just as much chance at winning as playing birthdays, anniversary dates, or any personal system.

LOTTERY HUMORth

Did you hear about the guy who put his Powerball ticket in a box labeled “Schrodinger’s Cat?” He figured without opening the box, he increased his odds from 1:292,000,000, to 50/50 – as long as he didn’t open the box!

A Man Wins the Lottery rushes into his house and yells to his wife, “Martha, pack up your things. I just won the state lottery!”
Martha replies, “Shall I pack for warm weather or cold?”
The man responds, “I don’t care. Just so long as you’re out of the house by noon!”

Did you hear about the new 3 million dollar State Lottery? The winner gets 3 dollars a year for a million years.

The best bet for a player to make is what is called a “Mind Bet” You stand behind the game watch the action and attempt to predict the winner. You never bet any real money you only bet in your mind. Last week a friend of mine lost his mind three times.

WEIRD LOTTERY FACTS

  • …if you put $20 a month into buying lottery tickets from age 25 to 65, you’ll likely come out with next to nothing. If you instead put that into a mutual fund, you would have $93,626.41, after taxes!
  • …5 years or less is the typical amount of time it takes a lottery winner to burn through his winnings.
  • The first recorded signs of a lottery are keno slips from the Chinese Han Dynasty between 205 and 187 BC. These lotteries are believed to have helped to finance major government projects like the Great Wall of China. (interesting – gambling to fund social / public projects, hmmm….some things haven’t changed)images
  • In America, the numbers game operated out of “Policy shops” in the U.S. prior to 1861, where bettors choose numbers. By the early 20th century, the game was associated with poor communities, and could be played for as little as a penny.

An Interesting LOTTERY Story

The U.S. Powerball lottery drawing of the March 30, 2005 game produced an unprecedented 110 second-place winners, all of whom picked five numbers correctly with no Powerball number. The total came out to $19.4 million in unexpected payouts. 89 tickets won $100,000, but 21 additional tickets won $500,000 due to the Power Play multiplier option. PowerballPowerball officials initially suspected fraud, but it turned out that all the winners received their numbers from fortune cookies made by Wonton Food Inc., a fortune cookie factory in Long Island City, Queens, New York. The number combinations printed on fortunes are reused in thousands of cookies per day. The five winning numbers were 22, 28, 32, 33, and 39. The sixth number in the fortune, 40, did not match the Powerball number, 42.

So, it’s true – You Can’t Win If You Don’t Play. Have fun with it, since, you’re likelier to die getting struck by lightning than winning the Powerball jackpot: 1 in 134,906.

That’s all for now. I have to rush down to Lotto Mart to buy “a” ticket.

Binbin

POWERBALL Mania – Truths and Real Chances

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pb_logo

Tis the season to start dreaming. But don’t quit your day job just yet. You’ve Heard it Said Before  – “You Can’t Win If You Don’t Play”  

How about some other similar sayings, like:

“You Can’t Win If You Don’t Enter” (Still waiting for the balloons & GIGANTIC Check!)

“You Can’t Sit If You Want to be Fit” (True! I found that saying sitting in my recliner!)

“(If) You Can’t Say Something Nice, Don’t say ANYTHING AT ALL”

“You Can’t Complain If You Don’t Vote” (Just think – If we had a $1 National Complaint Jar, We’d turn that deficit around in no time!)

poor-t-rex_o_177370

“You Can’t Make Your Bed If You’re a Tyrannosaurus Rex”(Ok, that’s kinda off track, but pretty funny)

Here are some truths about Powerball:images (1)

  • 75% of Jackpot winners used Quick Picks for their numbers.
  • The four winning-est Powerball Numbers are 26, 41, 22, 16
  • The odds are so large that even buying every number combination at $2 a ticket would cost you $584 million.  Sounds like a profit, right.  After taxes, you’ll still owe millions.
  • Lottery results are completely random, so no one can control the outcome. It is impossible to predict a number beyond its overall probability of appearing among the winning numbers. A random guess has just as much chance at winning as playing birthdays, anniversary dates, or any personal system. Players can’t control lottery outcomes by using various methods to forecast winning numbers – if so, would it be over $800,000,000?
  • The rules were changed on October 7, 2015 to make the jackpot harder to hit, and thus grow larger jackpots. The previous jackpot probability was 1 in 175.2 million. It is now 1 in 292.2 million.
  • Buying more tickets does not increase your chances.  Each ticket should be considered like one play on a slot machine – one event. THE ODDS DON’T CHANGE! YOU DON’T HAVE A BETTER CHANCE IF MORE OR LESS PEOPLE BUY TICKETS, OR WHATEVER THE JACKPOT IS!Losers-e1443618224855

WHAT ARE YOUR CHANCES – REALLY?

While it is true – “You Can’t Win If You Don’t Play,” what chances do you have to win? You have a better chance of the following instead of winning Powerball:

1. Dying from an asteroid strike: 1 in 74,817,414

2. Getting killed by a terrorist act in the United States: 1 in 10,000,000

3. Getting murdered during a trip to the Grand Canyon: 1 in 8,156,000

4. Dying from chronic constipation: 1 in 2,215,900

5. Becoming a movie star: 1 in 1,505,000

6. Getting struck by lightning: 1 in 1,101,000

7. Birthing identical quadruplets – Odds: 13,000,000 to 1

8. Becoming an astronaut – Odds: 12,100,000 to 1

9. Getting a royal flush in a first hand of poker – Odds: 649,740 to 1

10. Finding a four leaf clover – Odds: 10,000 to 1

So, it’s true – You Can’t Win If You Don’t Play. Have fun with it, since, you’re likelier to die getting struck by lightning than winning the Powerball jackpot: 1 in 134,906.

That’s all for now. I have to rush down to Lotto Mart to buy “a” ticket.

Binbin

Lottery & Scratch Tickets – Exercise of Hope or Futility?

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lotteryCan I say that state lotteries and scratch tickets are not a good gamble without getting people all riled up?  We all know they are some of the worst odds to winning other than one-card monte?

Well there are some things to help your incredible poor and hopeless odds – but by no means am I saying it will make you a winner.

For example, did you know that every roll of tickets begins with ticket number “000,” so the higher the number, the greater the likelihood that somebody has already bought one or all of the winning tickets. Therefore, avoid tickets with higher numbers.  (Of course, that’s just in one store or vender)

Scratch TicketsDid you know scratch off tickets continue to be sold even after the top prizes have been won?  Imagine playing max on a slot machine advertising a million dollar jackpot – but you didn’t know it was already given away. So, check the lottery’s homepage to see which games have been won. Every scratch off game has a given number of top prizes. However, it is still perfectly legal for a retailer to continue selling the rest of its tickets after all the top prizes have already been claimed.

Fortunately for the players, this information is available on the state’s lottery homepage.

Logically, the newest games will typically have the most unclaimed prizes, so try to find a retailer that sells these games.

So, what about lottery tickets. How much do I really know about the lottery, or rather, how much do I really WANT to know?  First question I had was “are Scratch off tickets considered Lottery?” Yes, they are. And here are a few more interesting and fun facts about Lottery Tickets – some will definitely make you think about buying them again!Lottery

Did you know that:

  • …if you put $20 a month into buying lottery tickets from age 25 to 65, you’ll likely come out with next to nothing. If you instead put that into a mutual fund, you would have $93,626.41, after taxes!
  • …when asked if you’d quit your job after winning the lottery, you should lie. It’s a fairly common question asked by job interviewers: If you won the lottery, would you keep working? Companies aren’t really concerned about the possibility this would happen, and on some level every hiring manager has to know that most people would quit if hundreds of millions of dollars fell into their lap. Nonetheless, the question is asked because the answer can reveal just how little the job applicant cares about work and his career or the company doing the hiring. It’s something of a trick question, so pause before answering — and when you answer, don’t blab on about how much you loathe the idea of having to get up in the morning to go to the office
  • …5 years or less is the typical amount of time it takes a lottery winner to burn through his winnings
  • …you’re far more likely to die a horrible death than win. The statistics say that, compared with winning the lottery, you are 33 times as likely to be killed by bees, 50 times as likely to be struck by lightning, 8,000 times as likely to be murdered and 20,000 times as likely to be killed in a car crash.
  • …the first recorded signs of a lottery are keno slips from the Chinese Han Dynasty between 205 and 187 BC. These lotteries are believed to have helped to finance major government projects like the Great Wall of China. (Some things never change)
    1776 Lottery ticket issued by the Continental Congress to finance the American Revolutionary War.

    1776 Lottery ticket issued by the Continental Congress to finance the American Revolutionary War.

    …in America, The numbers game operated out of “Policy shops”, where bettors choose numbers, were in the U.S. prior to 1861. By the early 20th century, the game was associated with poor communities, and could be played for as little as $0.01

An Interesting Story….
…the U.S. Powerball lottery drawing of the March 30, 2005 game produced an unprecedented 110 second-place winners, all of whom picked five numbers correctly with no Powerball number. The total came out to $19.4 million in unexpected payouts. 89 tickets won $100,000, but 21 additional tickets won $500,000 due to the Power Play multiplier option. PowerballPowerball officials initially suspected fraud, but it turned out that all the winners received their numbers from fortune cookies made by Wonton Food Inc., a fortune cookie factory in Long Island City, Queens, New York. The number combinations printed on fortunes are reused in thousands of cookies per day. The five winning numbers were 22, 28, 32, 33, and 39. The sixth number in the fortune, 40, did not match the Powerball number, 42.

Now, Myths and Facts
Myth: There are “hot numbers” that are drawn more often than others.
Fact: Lottery draws are completely random, so there are no hot numbers. Every number has an equal chance of being drawn, so every set of lottery numbers has the same chance of winning.

Myth: “Fresh” or newly arrived tickets are luckier than tickets from a previous week.
Fact: The probability of purchasing a winning ticket is the same over the lifespan of a lottery game. Unsold tickets from a previous week have the same chance of containing a winning ticket as newly delivered tickets.

Myth: Players can control lottery outcomes by using various methods to forecast winning numbers.
Fact: Lottery results are completely random, so no one can control the outcome. It is impossible to predict a number beyond its overall probability of appearing among the winning numbers. A random guess has just as much chance at winning as playing birthdays, anniversary dates, or any personal system.

Probably more info you needed to know, but after all I found, I still wonder why play? Hmm…..

That’s all for now.

Binbin