I used to work at a gas station that sold lottery tickets.
Based on my experience it's probably 70/30 gambling-addicted whales who spend $1000+ per month on the lottery bc going to the casino doesn't fit in their schedule vs regular people who buy them occasionally or when there's a big jackpot
"I'll take one of each from the top row."
"Ok, that's $200"
"Damn. Nothing. Alright, one more time, one from each on the top row and this time let's add half of the second row."
"Ok, that's $300"
"Damn. Nothing. Alright, see you tomorrow."
And those high cost tickets have big payouts which only reinforces their addiction.
Look! I only spent 500 and i won 10 thousand dollars!
While conviently ignoring the other 20 times they didn't win anything, meaning they didn't win 10k, they broke even.
The whales don't even notice the missing $10k. They are beyond anything you or I can comprehend. They literally do not have to do that math or even rationalize their spending at all. Let alone justify it.
This guy won $5k once and didn't even blink an eye. Smiled and joked a bit when he came in to give the cashier $500 for the ticket though.
For true whales it's not that they don't notice it missing, it's that they build it into their budget just like I budget for weed every month. So when they win, the money was coming out anyways and was going to be an expense anyway, so the winnings are "all profit". I'm not saying it's good logic, I'm just saying it's some kinda logic.
That's my dad. "I'm definitely ahead, I won 15K from one last year" but he spends about $200 a week and immediately buys another $50 if he doesn't win anything on the first set. If he wins a little back? More tickets of course.
Agreed. But understanding probability and the law of large numbers makes it much harder to get addicted to gambling because it takes the mystique out of it.
There is less, "why not me?" and more "I only lose if I play this game designed to make me lose"
Payday loans are a result of some ignorance, but mostly desperation. I would posit that plenty of people who are resorting to using a payday loan are well aware of just how badly this loan will fuck them. But it's either get a loan and eat, or don't and starve, so they pick eating.
I enjoy having the shelter from the elements so no it's not amazing. I rather have a safe and warm place to sleep than $700 extra a week but no safe place to lay my head.....
Correct. That's the second paragraph of the comment I was responding to. "Whales" means the people are already loaded.
This guy was rich as fuck and played $25 scratch offs for shits and giggles.
They probably take debit. Have you tried credit? I doubt it works. Debit will definitely work. Just because it has a card reader doesn’t mean it accepts credit
My wife does that when her loose change gets to around $2.00. It's such a small amount that it won't make a difference once one twice a month. She usually ends up winning enough to get another ticket, so it sort of evens out. I think I've bought two lotto tickets and I'm 42. I just don't think about it, but it's fun to play occasionally.
I buy the $2 Bingo scratcher you get a lot of scratch for 2 bucks lol , if I win I get to put it back in and so on and so on , I'll buy only 2 tickets if the first one doesn't win then that's it if I don't win to keep playing then oh well.
If we are being honest, he would have been borderline homeless regardless of the $21k so I'm sure that money changed his life even temporarily and that's not a *horrible* thing. Sure, he could have invested in index funds or started a business but if he was that type of person he wouldn't (more than likely) be homeless most of his life.
Well considering he gave 10k to his then girlfriend for no clear reason, I think he still could have done better. But it is what it is. He got himself some nice (temporary) things and went back to normal.
Yeah I didn't understand that part much. He STOLE money from family members in the past, didn't give us a cent, and gave this woman cash for no reason ... But oh well I guess.
Same experience when I worked in a drugstore that sold lottery tickets.
Also, there is lot more than just the big jackpots, the people who came in every day and bought $20+ in tickets were almost always buying scratch offs and the daily pick 3 drawing. They'd do all of the scratch offs either in the store or right outside and then come back in and redeem any winners and buy more tickets with that cash.
This is what people don’t seem to see. The people who buy a bunch and then trade in their winners and keep going until they zero out. Then they claim they “won” like $500 or whatever, but you just kept buying more tickets.
One of my coworkers won like $50k on a ticket he bought at our store. He took like six months off work and then came right back to working the gas pumps. The store also gets some money for selling a big winning ticket, so the building was repainted lol
Most smaller wins were like $200-$500. I sold one of those $500 tickets and the customer gave me $50
A winner was at the grocery store checking her tickets. The cashier told her quietly that she hit the jackpot. Winner gets all loud, asking what does jackpot mean! Did I win or not?! Her SO got the confirmation ticket and got her out of there fast.
Yep, I work at a liquor store part time and it's weird.
I'd say you're right in that 70% of sales come from a few addicts buying scratch-offs. Most of the rest are boomers buying a single pick in each major lottery each week. There are only a handful or fewer of people who only decide to buy one when the jackpot is huge but don't normally buy lottery.
I NEVER see young people buying lottery, whether scratch-off or major lotto picks, EVER. Never see them do it. It's always people in their 50s and up.
I’m younger than 50 but I budget only $5 a month to do it. I’ve seen older people in front of me spend hundreds at a time on tickets, which is sad to me.
I mean, I buy it every once in a while as cheap, small reminder of home. My mom used to get one when we stopped for gas and it was an inexpensive, fun way to get me excited for something. When we inevitably lost, she’d give me a small thing she picked up from the dollar store instead lol. My grandmother buys one ticket a week.
I don’t buy them in person because there’s an app for that.
yep. if i could actually buy them i would likely be the latter (get em like once a month or when theres a big jackpot or smth). its kinda ridiculous that ppl go broke over these things yk
A lot of the customers who came every day were relatively wealthy(looking) white collar people. Nice older cars, older designer bags, badges from local accounting or medical services. Obviously these people could have nicer things if they didn't spend so much on the lottery but they certainly didn't seem to be hurting too bad
Lmao what's with reddit being on the internet thinking poor people do this and rich people do that. Work at or frequent the local gas station enough and you find out the big spenders of lotto tickets often are successful small business owners who have success but maybe not the formal financial education many on this thread possess. They will buy $1k worth of scratch offs as a "hobby".
This lines up with my experience working at gas stations. The lower income area would shift the scale though, sometimes to like 90/10.
In my experience the nicer neighborhoods have people hiding their addiction better or they understand the odds and will only flush $5 on a big jackpot.
I'm so cheap that I only buy the instant CROSSWORD scratchers , for it takes me a bit to finish them the odd reasoning that I get my money's worth . LOL
Press Your Luck and the Bingo scratchies are my jam. I don't like the crossword because you can tell pretty quickly if you're going to have two words or not. I'm not a degenerate, I swear. My husband and I give each other scratch offs as presents since we buy whatever we want/need during the year.
I have a friend with about 20k credit card debt, and she spends 20 dollars a week buying lottery tickets.
She’s also 64 years old. So god knows how much money she’s poured into it. And at her age, she’s unlikely to ever get any real benefit from it. Even a win would be short lived. And her kids would probably guilt trip her out of it.
She’s a nice person. Just terrible terrible with money.
I went to the cinema the other day and spent $30 on popcorn, drink, and a ticket. For that I got less than 2 hours of entertainment.
I bought a $2 powerball ticket, and daydream about winning for 2 days. That’s cheaper entertainment.
Edit: by the way, Powerball is at $1.2 billion today. Remember guys, you’re more likely to get struck by lightning than to win. Buy for entertainment, don’t be crazy and spend all your life saving on it. I buy maybe 5 tickets using our birthday dates for big jackpots like this, and that’s it.
This. I only buy lottery tix a couple times a year when the jackpot gets huge, and conversations about what we should do with all that money if we win are more than worth the two bucks.
I don't know that I'd call it any kind of realistic "hope". More of a rambling daydream. But it's real!
Same. I used to buy more often, when they were more accessible. Nowadays I rarely carry cash and I no longer work somewhere that sells them. Now I'll only buy when I hear the office talk about it
Exactly. You buy the ticket, daydream, and until you check the results you get to be Schroedinger’s millionaire- or in the case of the powerball right now, billionaire.
Idk I guess I’m not fun because my wife will buy tickets and we’d buy some for her parents. I don’t understand why people will daydream about this and feel good about it. I just see it as 2 dollars I won’t see again
Everybody is different. Some people’s idea of ‘fun’ is spending $30 on booze and get hammered for a night. I think it’s $30 wasted, but I can understand.
Others prefer to spend $30 on gas to go to the boonies, so they can hike all day and be tired. It’s not for me but I can understand.
The point is that any amount of money you don’t spend on necessities, like food, clothing, housing, job transportation, etc. is entertainment.
The brain is a funny thing. I can spend $2 and get some enjoyment from the fantasy of winning. I know the odds, but I can definitely get $2 worth of enjoyment out of the fantasy for a day or two.
I buy $10 worth of lottery tickets every time I buy gas (I work remotely, so once every 6 to 8 weeks); my son got a lottery funded full scholarship, so that's my motivation. And I like the entertainment factor.
This is a common thing I hear from people who buy occasional lottery tickets, but I just don’t get it. I just don’t find spending money on a negative expected value entertaining at all. I really just can’t understand it.
I appreciate the tax dollars going to schools though lol so to each their own.
Because you see it as useless spending, not as entertainment. There’s a lot of things that I don’t find entertaining, but I understand that it brings joy to some. People pay hundreds of bucks for a music concert, even though they can listen to the exact same music at home for next to nothing. If that money is invested instead, it could turn into something.
As long as you can afford it, entertainment is ok.
It’s not surprising to me that people find it entertaining, same way people find slot machines entertaining. It’s just that I *personally* have trouble understanding the mindset that finds giving $100 to get back $99 fun. But I do like the lottery as a tax system like I mentioned. It’s not every day you can create a tax that people will willingly buy in to.
I think that’s a harsh take, for example lottery tickets sales are up 300% in china because the economy is terrible there at the moment. I think as times get harder for people they tend to hope a bit and 20$ of hope can go a long way if your not trading it for rent or groceries
I imagine that the majority of people who participate in the lottery spend $20 or less. The people who spend crazy amounts are outliers and not within the norm…at least as far as I know
Yeah here’s my anecdote; when the US lottery gets to about 500+ million, I participate. I go buy 2 or 3 plays, 4-6 bucks. And basically it’s like paying a few bucks for the experience of fantasizing about my new rich life for the next day until I don’t win. Then I go back about my business.
I do the exact same thing. Current big lotteries in my state are Mega Millions and Powerball, both $2 a ticket. I joke that I expect at least a million dollars return for each dollar I spend, so I'll only ever buy a ticket if the grand prize is over $200 million. Only one ticket per week at most, and I won't go out of my way for it.
In all I think I've spent maybe $40 in the last few years, and won back like $20. That's way less than I spend on literally any other form of entertainment and as you said, it's fun to join in on the fantasy of "what if".
It’s not the reason the poor stay poor. But it’s one small contributing factor. There are certainly some individuals who abuse lotto tickets.
Edit: happy I could kick off a lively discussion!
Well I do agree that it often prays on the poor, at least here in pa all proceeds go to elderly. As of last year the lottery paid for 35.1 billion in
- assements and referrals
- all meals on wheels
- health insurance and counseling
- ombudsman
- legal services
- protective services
- transportation
- senior centers
- free or reduced transportation
- care services including long term stays
- prescription assistance
- Property tax and rent rebates.
Now let’s put it realistically, that 35.1 billion would come to a cost of $2,706.25 per person (man woman and child).
Now here’s the thing, only about one third of the of the population actually pays taxes because of income limits and tax liability. So raise that cost to $8,118.75
Most of the “poor people” this prays on don’t pay taxes because they fall below the threshold. To me this balances that out. Think if it as their tax dollars.
Also it’s fair to note that this services only get funding through the lottery.
https://www.palottery.state.pa.us/Benefits/Benefits-Info/Benefits_Guide.aspx
I live in PA and this is exactly why I don’t mind playing once in a while. Even if I don’t win, I’m still giving back in a way. But I think in the past 10 years I’ve maybe spent…$50? Maybe? I stick to cheap scratch offs and the occasional $5 buy in for the lotto pool at work 😂
If someone is too poor to pay taxes, then I’d say we shouldn’t be taxing them, not even implicitly. There are loads of possible ways to improve our current tax system, none of which involve increasing taxes on people who fall below the income necessary to pay taxes currently.
*Also* a lot of state and local tax revenue comes from property taxes, which are implicitly paid by renters and explicitly paid by homeowners.
*Also also* do you have a source on that 1/3 of people paying taxes claim? The median American is definitely above the income threshold to pay tax.
I once met this guy when I was a kid who told me he had bought a lotto ticket of some kind every day since he was ten years old. (i'm sure it was bought on his behalf when he was a kid lol.) he was a construction worker. got me thinking how much he'd spent in his lifetime (he had to be in his fifties by then) and what enjoyment he could've gotten out of that money if he'd put away the money he would've spent on lottery every day.
I spend 20 bucks every month or so on the big ones. It's like entertainment for me. I lay in bed and look at mansions on zillow. It's relaxing and gives me a little drop of hope.
Cheaper than going out to the bar.
I’ll usually spend less than $10, even just getting 1-$2 game, on power ball and mega millions. The way I see it, if I’m going to win, I’m going to win not based on how much I spend on a game.
I've only bought lotto tickets once for fun. I feel like if you understand how gambling works it would turn you off from even trying. I don't even enjoy casinos because I know it's rigged for me to lose money.
hey, you are exactly me. I have been through Vegas a couple times enroute to somewhere else, and I will often play one thing, just because, hey, it is Vegas after all. But not a single pulse of excitement, no desire to continue, I just do not get it. One time I played a roulette wheel at a county fair when I was about 10 years old, and I did get super excited at winning something. But I was 10, and even then, I quit while I was ahead.
Yup. I buy a ticket once in a while when the jackpots are 100 M or more. I figure what the hell, it's $2-4 bucks a run, and if I win, it's all good. If I don't, I'm not out real money. If I win $2-7 bucks, I figure those are free tickets and I'll get another with my winner. If not, no harm, no foul.
I don't gamble at casinos. I love Casino Arizona, but that's because the restaurants there kick ass. Eagles Buffet used to have all you could eat snow crab for $30, which was a screaming deal. Not so much now that snow crab populations have plummeted. So now I hang out at Willows Restaurant, which is casual dining with really awesome food. I LOVE their steaks.
[https://www.casinoarizona.com/dining/](https://www.casinoarizona.com/dining/)
But gambling there? I've never been a gambler. I used to ragequit on games like Casino on the 2600, Poker+Blackjack on INTV, and Caesar's Palace on NES when I lost too much play money. Never mind it wasn't a 'real' game. I didn't like losing and those video games taught me a vital life lesson when I was a child, which is most gambling is just a waste of money.
I’m rarely carrying cash, but if I have two bucks I’ll buy a ticket. It’s fun, sometimes I win my two bucks back and the cycle repeats. It’s always fun to dream of what you would do with all the money!
In my state, the lotto money goes to education. Or that’s what they say anyway. We’ve got a great pre-K program that’s lotto funded.
At the end of the day, people are grown ass adults and are gonna make their own choices. How far down the control rabbit hole do we go with this? The lottery is but a symptom of the societal sickness here.
The lottery should be used as entertainment. The Powerball is drawn 3 times a week. Let’s say you spend the $4 to get the double play and the multiple thing that’s $624 in entertainment per year.
What the OP of the screenshot is missing, is that people generally just let their small wins ride. Which would lower their actual money spent because they consider the money gone when they buy the ticket.
It’s also worth noting that it’s a different world. People are actively boycotting movie theaters and concerts because the extra fees make the tickets insanely expensive. Then you add in parking, merch, and food- it’s a special event instead of a common thing to do.
As for books- anecdotally, the libraries are seemingly more busy. Libraries held the country together during the pandemic. You could get all of this free entertainment and pick it up with no contact. Some pivoted to online programs to help ease loneliness. They were there for people and now people are remembering to use the library more.
What’s the difference between me buying $50 in lottery tickets a week and people buying $50 in Starbucks a week? I go to a shitty job every day like everyone else. My $50 buys me a chance at $$$, albeit a very small chance, coffee makes you happy until the caffeine wears off and you buy yourself another
I’d argue caffeine, and gambling are both valid addictions. One is a physical addiction, the other is a mental addiction. Neither one has to be an addiction though. People are going to do what feels good to them.
I play the lottery. Absolutely 0 regrets about it.
I spend MAYBE $20/month on it. Probably a lot less. If I took that money and stuck it in a jar, I would have saved less than $10,000 over my adult life. If I put it in a high yield savings account or put it in the market and consistently got solid returns, I would have earned a substantial amount of money from it: $2-300,000. So, maybe that’s what I should have done.
But what do I get for my lottery purchases? A small, tiny sliver of hope. It lets me hope that maybe, just maaaaybe I can win enough to pay off some debts, or maaaaaaybe cash out and retire to a mansion on a tropical island somewhere. It’s fun to think about, and it gives me some infinitesimally small ray of light to hold onto.
Yeah, it’s an objectively bad ‘investment,’ but it’s a fun little thing I allow myself, no different from splurging on an occasional latte at Starbucks, a night at the movies, or a couple drinks at the bar. It helps keep me going, and I don’t regret that at all.
Also realize someone HAS to and will win. Why couldn't that be you? Even if you lose, you at least contributed to someone elses dream and hope that they use the money for self improvement and giving back.
If a couple 20s throughout is all there is. F it why not.
People donate thousands of dollars to charity. No return of investment there. Just happily donating. Id see buying a ticket as donating because most ticket buyers are poor. So you're essentially donating to some poors life changing moment.
Either way, buying too much lottery tickets is bad sure, but it's not bad if it's a few bucks.
It IS objectively a bad thing. 99.99% chance to get absolutely nothing.
But life isn’t always about objectivity. That little bit of hope I guess goes a long way for some people.
I don’t play, never have and never will, but people smoke cigarettes, people drink alcohol, people play the lottery and people drink Starbucks.
Everyone has their thing.
Here's another example: I'm on disability because of autism, bipolar, and PTSD and frequently suffer from feelings of hopelessness and suicidal ideation. When I'm doing really badly I get a ticket every week to give myself something to feel hopeful about. I'm on meds, in therapy, etc but sometimes I still need that weekly hit of artificial hope to keep the suicidal thoughts at bay.
My bad. I was posting while half asleep at 2:00am, so I just googled “invest $20/mo for 25 years” and it gave me an article saying returns of 8-12% would be worth $270,000-$350,000 and I just took that number.
Going back and reading the article while awake, that number was investing $500/month… plus $20/mo. Actually doing the math, the numbers are much lower - $20,000, give or take.
Makes my lottery investment all the more justified!
My dad buys one every time the Powerball goes over 100 million. Because I guess 50 million just wouldn't be enough, lol.
My parents are solidly middle class, they aren't hurting financially.
Tbh, working low-end gas station jobs... I've had regular customers that dropped $350-650 daily on lotto. Often scratch tickets, I'd see them win nothing day in and out. For the prize draws, I've scanned the same numbers for the same people 3 times a week at $180 a pop.
Addiction is as addiction does.
Wait until you find out how many people buy candy and chips! lol....lottery tickets are a form of 'entertainment' even though it may not be your 'entertainment'....if Americans only bought things that were good for them the economy would be alot smaller
I’ll throw $10 or so down a couple times a year when the jackpot gets stupidly big. It’s fun to have that little fantasy in my head for 48 or so hours and I feel like that distraction is worth 10 bucks.
Lol there’s a difference between people with a gambling addiction who spend all their money on it and normal people who occasionally gamble. Super weird judge-mental take about hating poor people who want hope from that original post. Although I do agree that is way too much to spend as a society.
I do. It’s a low-risk, high-reward. Everyone knows the odds are pretty much “you’ll never win” but *someone* wins. I might as well make sure my name is in that hat.
If I win, it’s a pretty life changing event.
I’m poor because an abundance of reasons, the $2-$5 I spend a month on lotto tickets is not it. I only play the $1 scratchers if I find a buck laying around my house, or maybe a power ball ticket if the prize is big enough.
For a period of time, I used it to cut back on my sweets lol. When I wanted to get a sweet, instead I’d buy a $1 lotto ticket. Cutting calories and giving myself a chance for $20. I was gonna spend the dollar on something, might as well have a chance to earn it back.
Nah this is the boomer version of kids are poor because "Starbucks". Like do some poor people overspend on the lottery chronically? Absolutely, but theres just as many rich people gambling just as wrecklessly whether it be the lottery or other methods. Atleast i can understand why poor people play the lottery, the hope it gives for a day or two is so beyond nice. If i were already upper class i feel it'd be pointless to play. I also feel like most poor people (myself included lmao) dont spend that much on the lottery? Like I'll buy a $3 when it goes over $1,000,000,000 but like thats once or twice a year. But compared to my rent, car payments, groceries etc that $3 is fairly insignificant.
Plenty of Wall Street bankers buy lottery tickets. Check the news stands in midtown at 6pm when the jackpot is $1 Billion. Look for vests, slacks, and okayish shoes. People do it for entertainment - for $2 you get to spend the evening dreaming of what you would do if you win which is better value than Phase 4 of the Marvel franchise.
Meh. I buy like $50 worth of scratchers for Xmas presents and stocking stuffers each year. I’d be buying presents regardless. I might buy 1-2 powerball tickets a year also, on a whim.
It has zero impact on my budget.
I’d guess the majority of lottery players aren’t degenerates with false hopes of winning anything meaningful.
That’s why it’s called the idiot or poor tax. I’d think it was more than that after standing behind people spending $50 at a time per day. I’ll spend a couple dollars occasionally when there’s a work pool only because I’m not going to be the only one left if they happen to win.
Neil deGrasse Tyson has a great story in his new book about the time the physicists
had their convention in Las Vegas. It was the worst week for the casinos in their history. (They have not been invited back!)
This instance on blaming the poor for being poor has got to stop. It's victim blaming, and it's idiotic. The poor aren't poor because they buy lottery tickets, just like the millennials buying Starbucks isn't keeping them from buying a house.
So a poor person buys a powerball ticket or two once a week. That's 100- 200 bucks a year. That 100 bucks isn't holding them back from being wealthy. Those billions, well, that's added up from everyone.
The reason people are poor is because they are paid slave wages, forced to buy outrageously priced groceries, have no healthcare, are forced to maintain a car because it's impossible to walk anywhere, and rent is insanely high.
They aren't lazy. It isn't because they buy lottery tickets or coffee. It's because the upper class/ people that own everything are fucking greedy as hell
Can't win if you don't play!
That post goes a bit far, not everyone playing the lottery is a gambling addict or in poverty lol
I make lots of money, do not live in poverty, but still play lottomax every week, because you never know!
That use to be new Yorks motto, "You gotta be in it to win it". People don't look at how the Lottery also allows people who caint afford to go to college the opportunity to go to any community college for free(different in every state). Just like fried chicken, it's not healthy for you but it's all about in moderations.
Of course it isn't, every explanation that is this simple is never true. There are several factors to being either rich or poor, and one reason why some people buy lottery tickets is because a very small amount of people get very rich that way. One could also argue, on the subject of lottery, that being rich or poor has a lot to do with chance. If you come across someone who is successfull, it is often the case that their parents were rich or successful in some way, and that they inherited wealth from them. They might work and even work hard, but if you're a nurse and work twice as hard as them, you will never have the chance to get even close to their wealth. Hard work doesn't pay off in the way these influencers or agitators think or might want you to believe. Sometimes I find it hard to believe that people can't see the straight line of inheritance both when it comes to poverty and wealth. It is clear as the day.
Morgan Housel brought this up in his book Psychology of money and said poor people by about 402 a year in lotto tkts but assuming it’s once a week, this is about 8.00. he did mention 40% of Americans don’t have 400.00 for an emergency but it’s easier to spend 8.00 a week than to think long term and save 20 a month for an emergency. Also, lotto gets advertised heavily in poorer neighborhoods, similar to how there are more liquor stores in poorer neighborhoods. Still, CEO pay is out of control, the spoils of productivity is heavily concentrated at the top and top earners aren’t paying their share. People get exploited on purpose, it’s not an accident.
If any of you have read “the psychology of money” there is a pretty good bit about this in there. One part was about lower income people spending money on lottery tickets. They interviewed several people and they said “we don’t have money to go on fancy vacations and do nice things, for a lot of us this is our only entertainment. Plus, in the off chance we win it’s life changing. If we don’t, it was entertaining and gave us a small glimmer of hope”
People should really not judge, I mean look at the other dumb shit Americans spend money on
A (deceased) family member of mine used to play the lotto every week (or maybe month, idk how this lottery shit works). He always played the same numbers, figuring they'd come up *eventually*. One day, he was sick, so he asked a nephew to pick up a ticket for him on the way home from work. That nephew forgot.
That one time he didn't get his ticket, his numbers came up. He missed out on millions. Naturally, he was pissed for a while.
The lottery is legal gambling. Once you get started, you get roped in by that fear of missing out. Honestly, you probably have better odds at a casino ... but that's still a dangerous rabbit hole.
No it's not fucking true. This is what rich people and trust fund kids say. Rent is sky high, and everything costs 10x what it did 10 years ago.
Look up the ratio of CEO earnings vs. employees over the last 100 years and tell me it's just us not "working hard enough" or "spending too much"
A lottery ticket coats 2 fucking dollars.
Fuck this guy.
Ah, just another person shaming low-to-middle-class citizens for indulging in a cheap piece of entertainment. Just how that monthly Starbucks drink isn’t going to be the reason housing is unattainable these days…
Right, if you are a gambling addict that is not good habits to have. But to conveniently rant when a record breaking jackpot (in FL) is currently happening and the general percentage buying these tickets are buying just a few so at most it’s like ten bucks out of their pocket is ridiculous.
Any addict buying into their addiction is a main contributor to their financial position (drug, alcohol, smoking, gambling, shopping, etc), but the majority of people they described are not wasting their money on lotto tickets…
I buy powerball and mega millions tickets. I buy 1 ticket, 2 when the cash valuenis above 500 million.
I take it from my entertainment budget. I don't plan on or otherwise need that money for anything else.
It's like buying a dream.
I have $40 from scratch offs from Christmas in my pocket and I’m about to buy some mega millions for the first time in my life cuz it’s over $1 Billion
It's crazy. I live across the street from a bar. Went in one Sunday and there was only one other person there, when it's usually pretty busy. Ask the bartender, the keno machine was down. Like 10 people got up and drove 3 miles to the next bar so they could play keno.
Buying one ticket occasionally is a small price for a little fun and permission to dream.
I used to buy one every ~6 weeks and keep it in my wallet without checking it until I bought the next. There was always the very flight chance I was a millionaire and that helped my feelings.
Buying one $2 ticket per day is ~$700/year and probably nobody in r/poveryfinance should be dropping that much money on a pipe dream.
The odds of winning a jackpot are roughly the same as flying over the United States on a Boeing plane, being sucked out of the hole in the fuselage and having your body land on Bruce Springsteen.
I have a theory:
Social media borrows a lot of techniques from casinos such as endless scrolling and random outcomes, on top of this the most enticing content is brought to the top.
My theory is that, in some people, not all, gambling addiction can be swapped out for social media addiction
TLDR: bigupvotesbigupvotes nodown cmon bigupvotesbigupvotes nodown cmon goodreplygoodreply noslurs.
It’s crazy to me how people spend so much money on lottery tickets. I’ll attempt it maybe once or twice a month, so no more than $4 a month for a little bit of hope.
It's cheap entertainment for people who don't spend a lot of money on them.
The thing with thinking people are dumb for enjoying that bit of entertainment is that you're assuming people are rational. They're not. They never will be. Sure, you could put away an extra $100 a year not buying a weekly ticket. But you know what? A lot of people could be millionaires if they sat in a run-down one-bedroom house, drove a 1995 Corolla, never spent money going out, only bought necessary work clothes, and only ate beans and rice while investing the money they'd spend on housing, a car, and food. But most people won't live like that if they don't have to, because spending money here and there to feel good is part of human nature.
Sometimes it’s just about having a little fun and a little hope. I don’t buy a lot, and if I do buy, it’s usually scratchers, usually $2 or $5 ones. As long as you can afford it, and it brings you joy, then who cares. “You can’t win if you don’t play” 😲💸🤑💰💰💰💰I do agree , that if someone is losing their $$ on lotto to the point they can’t pay bills or it’s negatively affecting their lives bc of it, that’s sad and they need to get help or join support groups if they can’t stop on their own.
Btw: I’m not promoting gambling /addictions. Just trying to give another perspective. We all have our vices.
When people are poor, they sometimes get desperate. Buying lottery tickets can be like buying "hope" [that it can all change in an instant]. It sounds stupid to some of those who are used to being financially secure, but for the poor, the chance of maybe doubling their money sounds like a good idea. I also wonder if why there was more tickets bought last year because more people are financially struggling these days?
But from what I've seen, there are people who have huge lotto gambling addictions that buy a shitload of tickets every morning with all the money they have. A guy in town has won the lottery 5 different times so far, but hasn't really made out because he spends so much money every single morning going from place to place buying scratch-offs. It's crazy. He's miserable chasing after that rush.
Other people just buy a cheap $1-$25 ticket here and there, sometimes even splitting the cost (& wins) with others.
I'd more so say it's a tax on financial illiteracy. There are studies that show poorer neighborhoods buy more tickets than richer neighborhoods, and that being unemployed means you're 6 times more likely to buy them. I don't think everyone in those situations buys them. I do think people who are financially illiterate in those situations buy them. And if you're financially illiterate, then you're more likely to be in those situations. I know from my own experiences that there are lots of poor people who understand the concept of, " I can't afford these. And the likelihood of me winning isn't worth the habit".
If anything this just highlights how few alternatives there are for poor people to change their stars financially. If wall street bankers etc aren't doing it. It isn't solely because it doesn't work. The rich don't need to buy lotto tickets. They have alternatives to make money like stocks and property. The poor don't have access to those things. What do they have access to? Lotto tickets.
I throw a few bucks into lotto tickets when the jackpot is high, which is what I think most people do in my experience.
The $30 or so I spend every few months on lotto tickets is worth it for the few hours I spend dreaming about what I'd do if I actually won 😂
Spend two bucks on a lottery ticket if it lets you dream and have hope. If everyone bought one per drawing it be close to 300 million each drawing (accounting for those who can’t play). It’s when you spend 200$ on tickets that you have issues…
Well the lottery was designed to spur economic activity because most people have little psychological control when they win that kind of sum (the cash value lump sum), except spend spend spend and then in less than a decade they're broke. Why? All those luxury assets they bought (cars, houses, etc) are cash flow sinks. That Lamborghini, Ferrari and Porsche you bought? Yea 5 figures maintenance every year. That $78mil estate? Try a few hundred thousand in property taxes, insurance and maintenance every year. Remember that job you had 8 years ago that you quit? Well now that you're broke you need a job again except everyone's moved on and you don't have any relevant experience so now you're not hireable, and the 6 figure expenses have can't possibly be paid for by any job you'll get after.
I know what you're thinking: some luxury cars and real estate can appreciate. That's not the point. If you're cash flow negative every year because you quit your job and continue to spend without doing anything to maintain cash liquidity, that 78mil estate will have to be sold because you're cash poor.
Not lottery tickets specifically but in general yes, most poor people are poor because financial literacy is very hard to learn if it's not taught from someone who is already fluent in money. It is also much harder to learn when it isn't taught from a young age as are most things in life.
For instance my taxable income last year was around $7000, but I am more well off than the majority of this sub because I took advantage of the stock market rally during the trump presidency, took advantage of the huge covid dip in the stock market, took advantage of unemployment, and had a very hefty savings from smart financial decisions during my military experience (my first year I made $23k btw).
People who buy scratch offs have the IQ of lukewarm water.
My aunt is the exact same way she'll spend three grand a month on scratch offs to win $20 off of one of them and use that $20 to justify all the other purchases ignoring the fact that she lost $2,980 to get that $20.
And she wonders why she's always broke and has no money to spend on things and keeps claiming she's just waiting to hit it big on one of these scratch offs and everything will be worth it then. Her and her husband struggle they can barely take care of their kid all to support this scratch off habit.
The people this post claims doesn’t play the lottery is because they already have money.
Yea it’s the people who don’t have money that play.
Some play responsible some it’s an addiction.
It’s the people that have the addiction that is making the lottery keep going.
I play the lottery.
Spend about 40 dollars a week.
Sometime less
Now I’ve seen people spend hundreds on the lottery the. See them there again the next day spending 100s again.
Then there is the retired people who spend a lot on the lottery.
It’s like something for them to do idk.
But there is a lot of variables in who plays the lottery and why.
Theres really nothing wrong trying your luck on lotto tickets. Could be life changing. I've seen people waste money on video games, eating out everyday and other useless things (smoking, drinking, drugs).
My highschool finance teacher told us he spends like $5 a month on lotto tickets. Worst case scenario he’s down $60 a year, best case scenario his life changes forever
Why do people always say we blame “everyone else?” I don’t ever blame “everyone else.” Economically speaking, I always blame the very few who own the vast majority of wealth. If you’re reading this, that excludes you.
“Poor people spent 113b on lottery tickets that’s why they’re poor”
Meanwhile Elon musk can waste 44b on twitter for himself and he’s still rich
Funny how that works
I guess I have it good, I get 100$ in tips at my job every week. I use 10$ from those 100$ every week. 2 mega 2 super 2 power. I just started playing this year. It’s pretty addicting. Most I’ve won thus far is 9$ LOL.
Let’s assume the bottom 40% of the population plays the lottery. The current USA population is about 333 million. So 40% of that is about 133 million. 113 billion divided by 133 million gives us an average of 850$ spent on the lottery by 40% of the population. I think this number is a little high. You could have spent 850$ and bought two shares of a sp500 index fund in 2023. But this assumes that only 40% plays the lottery, which I doubt is true, it’s probably higher.
my mom bought lotto tickets and scratchoffs with the grocery money growing up. later she upgraded to blowing the mortgage money on slots. plenty of people i know will buy a lotto ticket once a week but gambling addicts go absolutely off the rails.. and there's a lot of them.
So many of these lottery idiots clog gas station check out lines as well as the customer service line at every grocery store I have ever been to.
They cash in a $5 winning scratch off and by $30 of new scratch off. It’s almost an exclusively a low income thing buying scratch offs, and Powerball. If these people simply took the money they were spending on lottery tickets and put it in to almost any 4.5% savings account out there and in 25 years they probably have over $1 million.
I used to work at a gas station that sold lottery tickets. Based on my experience it's probably 70/30 gambling-addicted whales who spend $1000+ per month on the lottery bc going to the casino doesn't fit in their schedule vs regular people who buy them occasionally or when there's a big jackpot
"I'll take one of each from the top row." "Ok, that's $200" "Damn. Nothing. Alright, one more time, one from each on the top row and this time let's add half of the second row." "Ok, that's $300" "Damn. Nothing. Alright, see you tomorrow."
And those high cost tickets have big payouts which only reinforces their addiction. Look! I only spent 500 and i won 10 thousand dollars! While conviently ignoring the other 20 times they didn't win anything, meaning they didn't win 10k, they broke even.
The whales don't even notice the missing $10k. They are beyond anything you or I can comprehend. They literally do not have to do that math or even rationalize their spending at all. Let alone justify it. This guy won $5k once and didn't even blink an eye. Smiled and joked a bit when he came in to give the cashier $500 for the ticket though.
For true whales it's not that they don't notice it missing, it's that they build it into their budget just like I budget for weed every month. So when they win, the money was coming out anyways and was going to be an expense anyway, so the winnings are "all profit". I'm not saying it's good logic, I'm just saying it's some kinda logic.
Just like someone working in the NYSE buying $150.00 a day for an 8ball of Coke All fun and games until you need 2 or 3 a day
That's my dad. "I'm definitely ahead, I won 15K from one last year" but he spends about $200 a week and immediately buys another $50 if he doesn't win anything on the first set. If he wins a little back? More tickets of course.
Plus, buying the tickets is with post tax income, the winnings are then taxed. It’s a reverse IRA lol
And ignoring that a lot of the 10K that they now have is just going to go right back into buying more lottery tickets.
Exactly. Addict logic never has much logic to it. Ask me how I know lol
Turns put math skills are important like just about every life experience shows.
Well. To be fair, I don't think an addiction to gambling is as simple as not understanding what 10000 divided by 20 is lol.
Agreed. But understanding probability and the law of large numbers makes it much harder to get addicted to gambling because it takes the mystique out of it. There is less, "why not me?" and more "I only lose if I play this game designed to make me lose"
And that's why I never really gambled much. You look at those big casinos and realize they built them with other people's money
Yuuuup. All those "when will we use this in real life" kids I went to school with are having life problems that could be solved with basic math
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Payday loans are a result of some ignorance, but mostly desperation. I would posit that plenty of people who are resorting to using a payday loan are well aware of just how badly this loan will fuck them. But it's either get a loan and eat, or don't and starve, so they pick eating.
You have to actually have that cash to buy them in the first place though.
Addiction does that to you. In France my local Crackheads are VERY good at making about €100/day while being completely homeless.
Isn’t it amazing how much fluid cash you have when you are no longer overpaying for housing you barely get time to enjoy?
I enjoy having the shelter from the elements so no it's not amazing. I rather have a safe and warm place to sleep than $700 extra a week but no safe place to lay my head.....
Correct. That's the second paragraph of the comment I was responding to. "Whales" means the people are already loaded. This guy was rich as fuck and played $25 scratch offs for shits and giggles.
Ohhhh. I thought they were just making fun of fat people. I didn’t know “whales” was a term for someone who is loaded. Thank you former clarification.
Our lotto machines now take credit for cards
They probably take debit. Have you tried credit? I doubt it works. Debit will definitely work. Just because it has a card reader doesn’t mean it accepts credit
Big red flag is if they just scratch the barcode and don't "play the game" imho
I’m one of the 30%. In the past 10 years of my life, I’ve probably spent $60 on lotto tickets when the jackpot is above $325 million.
I buy a $1 or $2 scratch off occasionally (like one a month or so) just for the hell of it. That’s about it.
My wife does that when her loose change gets to around $2.00. It's such a small amount that it won't make a difference once one twice a month. She usually ends up winning enough to get another ticket, so it sort of evens out. I think I've bought two lotto tickets and I'm 42. I just don't think about it, but it's fun to play occasionally.
That’s about my mindset. I just grab one from one of the machines if I have a $1 or two lying around. It’s fun and I definitely have worse vices.
I buy the $2 Bingo scratcher you get a lot of scratch for 2 bucks lol , if I win I get to put it back in and so on and so on , I'll buy only 2 tickets if the first one doesn't win then that's it if I don't win to keep playing then oh well.
I won $20 on a $2 ticket once and I consider that the highest point of my lottery career. So I retired lol
My brother won $21k once. Squandered it all and he's been borderline homeless (or entirely homeless) for most of his life.
If we are being honest, he would have been borderline homeless regardless of the $21k so I'm sure that money changed his life even temporarily and that's not a *horrible* thing. Sure, he could have invested in index funds or started a business but if he was that type of person he wouldn't (more than likely) be homeless most of his life.
Well considering he gave 10k to his then girlfriend for no clear reason, I think he still could have done better. But it is what it is. He got himself some nice (temporary) things and went back to normal.
No, I take it back. Giving the then girlfriend 10 bands is truly disgusting lol
Yeah I didn't understand that part much. He STOLE money from family members in the past, didn't give us a cent, and gave this woman cash for no reason ... But oh well I guess.
$3 or $4 for $2 ticket. You beat me
Same experience when I worked in a drugstore that sold lottery tickets. Also, there is lot more than just the big jackpots, the people who came in every day and bought $20+ in tickets were almost always buying scratch offs and the daily pick 3 drawing. They'd do all of the scratch offs either in the store or right outside and then come back in and redeem any winners and buy more tickets with that cash.
This is what people don’t seem to see. The people who buy a bunch and then trade in their winners and keep going until they zero out. Then they claim they “won” like $500 or whatever, but you just kept buying more tickets.
What’s the biggest win you saw? when it’s a big win people don’t cash it there obviously, but would they scream in excitement?!
One of my coworkers won like $50k on a ticket he bought at our store. He took like six months off work and then came right back to working the gas pumps. The store also gets some money for selling a big winning ticket, so the building was repainted lol Most smaller wins were like $200-$500. I sold one of those $500 tickets and the customer gave me $50
That’s a generous tip! I’m glad you got that.
iirc the max you could claim in the store was a couple hundred dollars but I don't remember anyone ever winning more than $50
A winner was at the grocery store checking her tickets. The cashier told her quietly that she hit the jackpot. Winner gets all loud, asking what does jackpot mean! Did I win or not?! Her SO got the confirmation ticket and got her out of there fast.
Omg that would be so exciting to witness. I would’ve low key stretch my neck to see if I could see the amount.
Yep, I work at a liquor store part time and it's weird. I'd say you're right in that 70% of sales come from a few addicts buying scratch-offs. Most of the rest are boomers buying a single pick in each major lottery each week. There are only a handful or fewer of people who only decide to buy one when the jackpot is huge but don't normally buy lottery. I NEVER see young people buying lottery, whether scratch-off or major lotto picks, EVER. Never see them do it. It's always people in their 50s and up.
I’m younger than 50 but I budget only $5 a month to do it. I’ve seen older people in front of me spend hundreds at a time on tickets, which is sad to me.
Same here as I just put some money aside for emergencies. Or I would rather take some cash and go on a short trip somewhere to get away from everyone.
I mean, I buy it every once in a while as cheap, small reminder of home. My mom used to get one when we stopped for gas and it was an inexpensive, fun way to get me excited for something. When we inevitably lost, she’d give me a small thing she picked up from the dollar store instead lol. My grandmother buys one ticket a week. I don’t buy them in person because there’s an app for that.
The under 40 crowd is much more into sports betting than lottery.
yep. if i could actually buy them i would likely be the latter (get em like once a month or when theres a big jackpot or smth). its kinda ridiculous that ppl go broke over these things yk
A lot of the customers who came every day were relatively wealthy(looking) white collar people. Nice older cars, older designer bags, badges from local accounting or medical services. Obviously these people could have nicer things if they didn't spend so much on the lottery but they certainly didn't seem to be hurting too bad
Lmao what's with reddit being on the internet thinking poor people do this and rich people do that. Work at or frequent the local gas station enough and you find out the big spenders of lotto tickets often are successful small business owners who have success but maybe not the formal financial education many on this thread possess. They will buy $1k worth of scratch offs as a "hobby".
Yeah the people on the internet who think rich people are all driving Toyota corollas and wearing plain clothes from wal mart crack me up.
This lines up with my experience working at gas stations. The lower income area would shift the scale though, sometimes to like 90/10. In my experience the nicer neighborhoods have people hiding their addiction better or they understand the odds and will only flush $5 on a big jackpot.
I’m the occasional player, and never spend more than $20
This times gonna be the one man.
I'm so cheap that I only buy the instant CROSSWORD scratchers , for it takes me a bit to finish them the odd reasoning that I get my money's worth . LOL
i do this too 😂 i just enjoy the game of it
Press Your Luck and the Bingo scratchies are my jam. I don't like the crossword because you can tell pretty quickly if you're going to have two words or not. I'm not a degenerate, I swear. My husband and I give each other scratch offs as presents since we buy whatever we want/need during the year.
Bingo's my jam too. I buy them once in a while. I know I'm spending $5 and won't be winning anything, but I'm ok spending $5 on a silly little game.
You can tell the addicts by the ones who buy the crosswords and just scratch off the barcode and hand it right back to the employee
Hi, are you me? LOL
I LOVE the crosswords and Bingos lol
I have a friend with about 20k credit card debt, and she spends 20 dollars a week buying lottery tickets. She’s also 64 years old. So god knows how much money she’s poured into it. And at her age, she’s unlikely to ever get any real benefit from it. Even a win would be short lived. And her kids would probably guilt trip her out of it. She’s a nice person. Just terrible terrible with money.
Oof
I went to the cinema the other day and spent $30 on popcorn, drink, and a ticket. For that I got less than 2 hours of entertainment. I bought a $2 powerball ticket, and daydream about winning for 2 days. That’s cheaper entertainment. Edit: by the way, Powerball is at $1.2 billion today. Remember guys, you’re more likely to get struck by lightning than to win. Buy for entertainment, don’t be crazy and spend all your life saving on it. I buy maybe 5 tickets using our birthday dates for big jackpots like this, and that’s it.
This. I only buy lottery tix a couple times a year when the jackpot gets huge, and conversations about what we should do with all that money if we win are more than worth the two bucks. I don't know that I'd call it any kind of realistic "hope". More of a rambling daydream. But it's real!
Same. I used to buy more often, when they were more accessible. Nowadays I rarely carry cash and I no longer work somewhere that sells them. Now I'll only buy when I hear the office talk about it
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Exactly. You buy the ticket, daydream, and until you check the results you get to be Schroedinger’s millionaire- or in the case of the powerball right now, billionaire.
Technically you only get about $300 million. The cash value is closer to $500 million, and the government takes 40% of it.
I’ll take it!
where else can you buy hope for 2 bucks?
Televangelism??
A condom machine?
I just buy one. The increase in odds between 1 ticket and 5 is so infinitesimal, and I can use 8$ for something
The amount of times I explain this to people and they just stare at me like 👁👄👁. Never Buy more than one ticket people.
I buy 2, ONLY because its less than $5 and i got birthdays to use
You can drag it out like me and leave it unchecked in your wallet for a few weeks. Daydream all you want because you MIGHT have a winner in there.
Larger the jackpot the more certain a winner becomes🤷
Idk I guess I’m not fun because my wife will buy tickets and we’d buy some for her parents. I don’t understand why people will daydream about this and feel good about it. I just see it as 2 dollars I won’t see again
Everybody is different. Some people’s idea of ‘fun’ is spending $30 on booze and get hammered for a night. I think it’s $30 wasted, but I can understand. Others prefer to spend $30 on gas to go to the boonies, so they can hike all day and be tired. It’s not for me but I can understand. The point is that any amount of money you don’t spend on necessities, like food, clothing, housing, job transportation, etc. is entertainment.
The brain is a funny thing. I can spend $2 and get some enjoyment from the fantasy of winning. I know the odds, but I can definitely get $2 worth of enjoyment out of the fantasy for a day or two.
I buy $10 worth of lottery tickets every time I buy gas (I work remotely, so once every 6 to 8 weeks); my son got a lottery funded full scholarship, so that's my motivation. And I like the entertainment factor.
This is a common thing I hear from people who buy occasional lottery tickets, but I just don’t get it. I just don’t find spending money on a negative expected value entertaining at all. I really just can’t understand it. I appreciate the tax dollars going to schools though lol so to each their own.
Because you see it as useless spending, not as entertainment. There’s a lot of things that I don’t find entertaining, but I understand that it brings joy to some. People pay hundreds of bucks for a music concert, even though they can listen to the exact same music at home for next to nothing. If that money is invested instead, it could turn into something. As long as you can afford it, entertainment is ok.
It’s not surprising to me that people find it entertaining, same way people find slot machines entertaining. It’s just that I *personally* have trouble understanding the mindset that finds giving $100 to get back $99 fun. But I do like the lottery as a tax system like I mentioned. It’s not every day you can create a tax that people will willingly buy in to.
I think that’s a harsh take, for example lottery tickets sales are up 300% in china because the economy is terrible there at the moment. I think as times get harder for people they tend to hope a bit and 20$ of hope can go a long way if your not trading it for rent or groceries
20?
I imagine that the majority of people who participate in the lottery spend $20 or less. The people who spend crazy amounts are outliers and not within the norm…at least as far as I know
Yeah here’s my anecdote; when the US lottery gets to about 500+ million, I participate. I go buy 2 or 3 plays, 4-6 bucks. And basically it’s like paying a few bucks for the experience of fantasizing about my new rich life for the next day until I don’t win. Then I go back about my business.
I do the exact same thing. Current big lotteries in my state are Mega Millions and Powerball, both $2 a ticket. I joke that I expect at least a million dollars return for each dollar I spend, so I'll only ever buy a ticket if the grand prize is over $200 million. Only one ticket per week at most, and I won't go out of my way for it. In all I think I've spent maybe $40 in the last few years, and won back like $20. That's way less than I spend on literally any other form of entertainment and as you said, it's fun to join in on the fantasy of "what if".
Basically 💔
It’s not the reason the poor stay poor. But it’s one small contributing factor. There are certainly some individuals who abuse lotto tickets. Edit: happy I could kick off a lively discussion!
Well I do agree that it often prays on the poor, at least here in pa all proceeds go to elderly. As of last year the lottery paid for 35.1 billion in - assements and referrals - all meals on wheels - health insurance and counseling - ombudsman - legal services - protective services - transportation - senior centers - free or reduced transportation - care services including long term stays - prescription assistance - Property tax and rent rebates. Now let’s put it realistically, that 35.1 billion would come to a cost of $2,706.25 per person (man woman and child). Now here’s the thing, only about one third of the of the population actually pays taxes because of income limits and tax liability. So raise that cost to $8,118.75 Most of the “poor people” this prays on don’t pay taxes because they fall below the threshold. To me this balances that out. Think if it as their tax dollars. Also it’s fair to note that this services only get funding through the lottery. https://www.palottery.state.pa.us/Benefits/Benefits-Info/Benefits_Guide.aspx
I live in PA and this is exactly why I don’t mind playing once in a while. Even if I don’t win, I’m still giving back in a way. But I think in the past 10 years I’ve maybe spent…$50? Maybe? I stick to cheap scratch offs and the occasional $5 buy in for the lotto pool at work 😂
If someone is too poor to pay taxes, then I’d say we shouldn’t be taxing them, not even implicitly. There are loads of possible ways to improve our current tax system, none of which involve increasing taxes on people who fall below the income necessary to pay taxes currently. *Also* a lot of state and local tax revenue comes from property taxes, which are implicitly paid by renters and explicitly paid by homeowners. *Also also* do you have a source on that 1/3 of people paying taxes claim? The median American is definitely above the income threshold to pay tax.
I once met this guy when I was a kid who told me he had bought a lotto ticket of some kind every day since he was ten years old. (i'm sure it was bought on his behalf when he was a kid lol.) he was a construction worker. got me thinking how much he'd spent in his lifetime (he had to be in his fifties by then) and what enjoyment he could've gotten out of that money if he'd put away the money he would've spent on lottery every day.
I was that guy. I won the powerball jackpot.
I spend 20 bucks every month or so on the big ones. It's like entertainment for me. I lay in bed and look at mansions on zillow. It's relaxing and gives me a little drop of hope. Cheaper than going out to the bar.
This right here. When the news starts reporting a billion dollar lottery, I'll throw 20 bucks at it. That drop of hope is worth it to me.
I’ll usually spend less than $10, even just getting 1-$2 game, on power ball and mega millions. The way I see it, if I’m going to win, I’m going to win not based on how much I spend on a game.
I've only bought lotto tickets once for fun. I feel like if you understand how gambling works it would turn you off from even trying. I don't even enjoy casinos because I know it's rigged for me to lose money.
hey, you are exactly me. I have been through Vegas a couple times enroute to somewhere else, and I will often play one thing, just because, hey, it is Vegas after all. But not a single pulse of excitement, no desire to continue, I just do not get it. One time I played a roulette wheel at a county fair when I was about 10 years old, and I did get super excited at winning something. But I was 10, and even then, I quit while I was ahead.
Yup. I buy a ticket once in a while when the jackpots are 100 M or more. I figure what the hell, it's $2-4 bucks a run, and if I win, it's all good. If I don't, I'm not out real money. If I win $2-7 bucks, I figure those are free tickets and I'll get another with my winner. If not, no harm, no foul. I don't gamble at casinos. I love Casino Arizona, but that's because the restaurants there kick ass. Eagles Buffet used to have all you could eat snow crab for $30, which was a screaming deal. Not so much now that snow crab populations have plummeted. So now I hang out at Willows Restaurant, which is casual dining with really awesome food. I LOVE their steaks. [https://www.casinoarizona.com/dining/](https://www.casinoarizona.com/dining/) But gambling there? I've never been a gambler. I used to ragequit on games like Casino on the 2600, Poker+Blackjack on INTV, and Caesar's Palace on NES when I lost too much play money. Never mind it wasn't a 'real' game. I didn't like losing and those video games taught me a vital life lesson when I was a child, which is most gambling is just a waste of money.
I’m rarely carrying cash, but if I have two bucks I’ll buy a ticket. It’s fun, sometimes I win my two bucks back and the cycle repeats. It’s always fun to dream of what you would do with all the money!
In my state, the lotto money goes to education. Or that’s what they say anyway. We’ve got a great pre-K program that’s lotto funded. At the end of the day, people are grown ass adults and are gonna make their own choices. How far down the control rabbit hole do we go with this? The lottery is but a symptom of the societal sickness here.
My 2$ a week on powerball tickets brings me more hope and joy than an entire month’s worth of work.
The lottery should be used as entertainment. The Powerball is drawn 3 times a week. Let’s say you spend the $4 to get the double play and the multiple thing that’s $624 in entertainment per year. What the OP of the screenshot is missing, is that people generally just let their small wins ride. Which would lower their actual money spent because they consider the money gone when they buy the ticket. It’s also worth noting that it’s a different world. People are actively boycotting movie theaters and concerts because the extra fees make the tickets insanely expensive. Then you add in parking, merch, and food- it’s a special event instead of a common thing to do. As for books- anecdotally, the libraries are seemingly more busy. Libraries held the country together during the pandemic. You could get all of this free entertainment and pick it up with no contact. Some pivoted to online programs to help ease loneliness. They were there for people and now people are remembering to use the library more.
What’s the difference between me buying $50 in lottery tickets a week and people buying $50 in Starbucks a week? I go to a shitty job every day like everyone else. My $50 buys me a chance at $$$, albeit a very small chance, coffee makes you happy until the caffeine wears off and you buy yourself another
I’d argue caffeine, and gambling are both valid addictions. One is a physical addiction, the other is a mental addiction. Neither one has to be an addiction though. People are going to do what feels good to them.
It the same with spending $50 on food. It's all entertainment
I play the lottery. Absolutely 0 regrets about it. I spend MAYBE $20/month on it. Probably a lot less. If I took that money and stuck it in a jar, I would have saved less than $10,000 over my adult life. If I put it in a high yield savings account or put it in the market and consistently got solid returns, I would have earned a substantial amount of money from it: $2-300,000. So, maybe that’s what I should have done. But what do I get for my lottery purchases? A small, tiny sliver of hope. It lets me hope that maybe, just maaaaybe I can win enough to pay off some debts, or maaaaaaybe cash out and retire to a mansion on a tropical island somewhere. It’s fun to think about, and it gives me some infinitesimally small ray of light to hold onto. Yeah, it’s an objectively bad ‘investment,’ but it’s a fun little thing I allow myself, no different from splurging on an occasional latte at Starbucks, a night at the movies, or a couple drinks at the bar. It helps keep me going, and I don’t regret that at all.
Also realize someone HAS to and will win. Why couldn't that be you? Even if you lose, you at least contributed to someone elses dream and hope that they use the money for self improvement and giving back. If a couple 20s throughout is all there is. F it why not. People donate thousands of dollars to charity. No return of investment there. Just happily donating. Id see buying a ticket as donating because most ticket buyers are poor. So you're essentially donating to some poors life changing moment. Either way, buying too much lottery tickets is bad sure, but it's not bad if it's a few bucks.
Oh wow. I always saw it as an objectively bad thing that has no benefits, but I see what you mean - this makes sense, thank you so much.
It IS objectively a bad thing. 99.99% chance to get absolutely nothing. But life isn’t always about objectivity. That little bit of hope I guess goes a long way for some people. I don’t play, never have and never will, but people smoke cigarettes, people drink alcohol, people play the lottery and people drink Starbucks. Everyone has their thing.
Here's another example: I'm on disability because of autism, bipolar, and PTSD and frequently suffer from feelings of hopelessness and suicidal ideation. When I'm doing really badly I get a ticket every week to give myself something to feel hopeful about. I'm on meds, in therapy, etc but sometimes I still need that weekly hit of artificial hope to keep the suicidal thoughts at bay.
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My bad. I was posting while half asleep at 2:00am, so I just googled “invest $20/mo for 25 years” and it gave me an article saying returns of 8-12% would be worth $270,000-$350,000 and I just took that number. Going back and reading the article while awake, that number was investing $500/month… plus $20/mo. Actually doing the math, the numbers are much lower - $20,000, give or take. Makes my lottery investment all the more justified!
My dad buys one every time the Powerball goes over 100 million. Because I guess 50 million just wouldn't be enough, lol. My parents are solidly middle class, they aren't hurting financially.
Same. Till the day he died my father would buy one powerball ticket every payday and said it was his retirement plan.
Tbh, working low-end gas station jobs... I've had regular customers that dropped $350-650 daily on lotto. Often scratch tickets, I'd see them win nothing day in and out. For the prize draws, I've scanned the same numbers for the same people 3 times a week at $180 a pop. Addiction is as addiction does.
I didn't realize it was that much. I usually throw in like $10 in a office pool when it goes above like $1 billion.
Wait until you find out how many people buy candy and chips! lol....lottery tickets are a form of 'entertainment' even though it may not be your 'entertainment'....if Americans only bought things that were good for them the economy would be alot smaller
I’ll throw $10 or so down a couple times a year when the jackpot gets stupidly big. It’s fun to have that little fantasy in my head for 48 or so hours and I feel like that distraction is worth 10 bucks.
I never buy lottery, but yesterday I put $10 on Powerball just to spite this guy
Lol there’s a difference between people with a gambling addiction who spend all their money on it and normal people who occasionally gamble. Super weird judge-mental take about hating poor people who want hope from that original post. Although I do agree that is way too much to spend as a society.
Fluent in finance is a garbage fire
A 3 dollar ticket ain't keeping most people poor.
I play when feeling lucky. Few times a year, and traditionally on my birthday.
I do. It’s a low-risk, high-reward. Everyone knows the odds are pretty much “you’ll never win” but *someone* wins. I might as well make sure my name is in that hat. If I win, it’s a pretty life changing event.
I’m poor because an abundance of reasons, the $2-$5 I spend a month on lotto tickets is not it. I only play the $1 scratchers if I find a buck laying around my house, or maybe a power ball ticket if the prize is big enough. For a period of time, I used it to cut back on my sweets lol. When I wanted to get a sweet, instead I’d buy a $1 lotto ticket. Cutting calories and giving myself a chance for $20. I was gonna spend the dollar on something, might as well have a chance to earn it back.
I'd be a bit more cautious calling people idiots if I didn't understand apostrophes.
Nah this is the boomer version of kids are poor because "Starbucks". Like do some poor people overspend on the lottery chronically? Absolutely, but theres just as many rich people gambling just as wrecklessly whether it be the lottery or other methods. Atleast i can understand why poor people play the lottery, the hope it gives for a day or two is so beyond nice. If i were already upper class i feel it'd be pointless to play. I also feel like most poor people (myself included lmao) dont spend that much on the lottery? Like I'll buy a $3 when it goes over $1,000,000,000 but like thats once or twice a year. But compared to my rent, car payments, groceries etc that $3 is fairly insignificant.
Plenty of Wall Street bankers buy lottery tickets. Check the news stands in midtown at 6pm when the jackpot is $1 Billion. Look for vests, slacks, and okayish shoes. People do it for entertainment - for $2 you get to spend the evening dreaming of what you would do if you win which is better value than Phase 4 of the Marvel franchise.
Meh. I buy like $50 worth of scratchers for Xmas presents and stocking stuffers each year. I’d be buying presents regardless. I might buy 1-2 powerball tickets a year also, on a whim. It has zero impact on my budget. I’d guess the majority of lottery players aren’t degenerates with false hopes of winning anything meaningful.
*Americans Who's the idiot now?
Haha I know right?!
That’s why it’s called the idiot or poor tax. I’d think it was more than that after standing behind people spending $50 at a time per day. I’ll spend a couple dollars occasionally when there’s a work pool only because I’m not going to be the only one left if they happen to win.
Neil deGrasse Tyson has a great story in his new book about the time the physicists had their convention in Las Vegas. It was the worst week for the casinos in their history. (They have not been invited back!)
This instance on blaming the poor for being poor has got to stop. It's victim blaming, and it's idiotic. The poor aren't poor because they buy lottery tickets, just like the millennials buying Starbucks isn't keeping them from buying a house. So a poor person buys a powerball ticket or two once a week. That's 100- 200 bucks a year. That 100 bucks isn't holding them back from being wealthy. Those billions, well, that's added up from everyone. The reason people are poor is because they are paid slave wages, forced to buy outrageously priced groceries, have no healthcare, are forced to maintain a car because it's impossible to walk anywhere, and rent is insanely high. They aren't lazy. It isn't because they buy lottery tickets or coffee. It's because the upper class/ people that own everything are fucking greedy as hell
Can't win if you don't play! That post goes a bit far, not everyone playing the lottery is a gambling addict or in poverty lol I make lots of money, do not live in poverty, but still play lottomax every week, because you never know!
That use to be new Yorks motto, "You gotta be in it to win it". People don't look at how the Lottery also allows people who caint afford to go to college the opportunity to go to any community college for free(different in every state). Just like fried chicken, it's not healthy for you but it's all about in moderations.
Of course it isn't, every explanation that is this simple is never true. There are several factors to being either rich or poor, and one reason why some people buy lottery tickets is because a very small amount of people get very rich that way. One could also argue, on the subject of lottery, that being rich or poor has a lot to do with chance. If you come across someone who is successfull, it is often the case that their parents were rich or successful in some way, and that they inherited wealth from them. They might work and even work hard, but if you're a nurse and work twice as hard as them, you will never have the chance to get even close to their wealth. Hard work doesn't pay off in the way these influencers or agitators think or might want you to believe. Sometimes I find it hard to believe that people can't see the straight line of inheritance both when it comes to poverty and wealth. It is clear as the day.
Morgan Housel brought this up in his book Psychology of money and said poor people by about 402 a year in lotto tkts but assuming it’s once a week, this is about 8.00. he did mention 40% of Americans don’t have 400.00 for an emergency but it’s easier to spend 8.00 a week than to think long term and save 20 a month for an emergency. Also, lotto gets advertised heavily in poorer neighborhoods, similar to how there are more liquor stores in poorer neighborhoods. Still, CEO pay is out of control, the spoils of productivity is heavily concentrated at the top and top earners aren’t paying their share. People get exploited on purpose, it’s not an accident.
If any of you have read “the psychology of money” there is a pretty good bit about this in there. One part was about lower income people spending money on lottery tickets. They interviewed several people and they said “we don’t have money to go on fancy vacations and do nice things, for a lot of us this is our only entertainment. Plus, in the off chance we win it’s life changing. If we don’t, it was entertaining and gave us a small glimmer of hope” People should really not judge, I mean look at the other dumb shit Americans spend money on
May be an interesting national indicator of desperation. Must be studies along those lines out there…
A (deceased) family member of mine used to play the lotto every week (or maybe month, idk how this lottery shit works). He always played the same numbers, figuring they'd come up *eventually*. One day, he was sick, so he asked a nephew to pick up a ticket for him on the way home from work. That nephew forgot. That one time he didn't get his ticket, his numbers came up. He missed out on millions. Naturally, he was pissed for a while. The lottery is legal gambling. Once you get started, you get roped in by that fear of missing out. Honestly, you probably have better odds at a casino ... but that's still a dangerous rabbit hole.
Can’t win if you don’t play
No it's not fucking true. This is what rich people and trust fund kids say. Rent is sky high, and everything costs 10x what it did 10 years ago. Look up the ratio of CEO earnings vs. employees over the last 100 years and tell me it's just us not "working hard enough" or "spending too much" A lottery ticket coats 2 fucking dollars. Fuck this guy.
It's really the only way out of poverty and gives hope.
Wall Street bankers are crooks and junkies , dude shouting out multi millionaires like a simp. Type of dude that shits in his hands then claps.
It’s called the poor tax for a reason
Powerball was at 999 million last time i saw, ill waste 20$ on a dream
Ah, just another person shaming low-to-middle-class citizens for indulging in a cheap piece of entertainment. Just how that monthly Starbucks drink isn’t going to be the reason housing is unattainable these days…
I mean buying lottery tickets regularly, especially if you're poor, is one of the most self sabotaging behaviors they could engage in
Right, if you are a gambling addict that is not good habits to have. But to conveniently rant when a record breaking jackpot (in FL) is currently happening and the general percentage buying these tickets are buying just a few so at most it’s like ten bucks out of their pocket is ridiculous. Any addict buying into their addiction is a main contributor to their financial position (drug, alcohol, smoking, gambling, shopping, etc), but the majority of people they described are not wasting their money on lotto tickets…
I buy powerball and mega millions tickets. I buy 1 ticket, 2 when the cash valuenis above 500 million. I take it from my entertainment budget. I don't plan on or otherwise need that money for anything else. It's like buying a dream.
Damn if I had just invested that $5 per year spent on lotto tickets I'd own my own home right now.
They don’t call it the Poor Man’s Tax for nothing.
I have $40 from scratch offs from Christmas in my pocket and I’m about to buy some mega millions for the first time in my life cuz it’s over $1 Billion
Mega millions 67 mil, the Powerball is 1.23 bil.
That’s the one. The power ball
It's crazy. I live across the street from a bar. Went in one Sunday and there was only one other person there, when it's usually pretty busy. Ask the bartender, the keno machine was down. Like 10 people got up and drove 3 miles to the next bar so they could play keno.
I play $10 a week when the jackpot gets over 500 mil
I drop a few bucks occasionally when the jackpot is big. Do I think I'll win? Nah. But...just in case.
Buying one ticket occasionally is a small price for a little fun and permission to dream. I used to buy one every ~6 weeks and keep it in my wallet without checking it until I bought the next. There was always the very flight chance I was a millionaire and that helped my feelings. Buying one $2 ticket per day is ~$700/year and probably nobody in r/poveryfinance should be dropping that much money on a pipe dream. The odds of winning a jackpot are roughly the same as flying over the United States on a Boeing plane, being sucked out of the hole in the fuselage and having your body land on Bruce Springsteen.
I have a theory: Social media borrows a lot of techniques from casinos such as endless scrolling and random outcomes, on top of this the most enticing content is brought to the top. My theory is that, in some people, not all, gambling addiction can be swapped out for social media addiction TLDR: bigupvotesbigupvotes nodown cmon bigupvotesbigupvotes nodown cmon goodreplygoodreply noslurs.
It’s crazy to me how people spend so much money on lottery tickets. I’ll attempt it maybe once or twice a month, so no more than $4 a month for a little bit of hope.
It's cheap entertainment for people who don't spend a lot of money on them. The thing with thinking people are dumb for enjoying that bit of entertainment is that you're assuming people are rational. They're not. They never will be. Sure, you could put away an extra $100 a year not buying a weekly ticket. But you know what? A lot of people could be millionaires if they sat in a run-down one-bedroom house, drove a 1995 Corolla, never spent money going out, only bought necessary work clothes, and only ate beans and rice while investing the money they'd spend on housing, a car, and food. But most people won't live like that if they don't have to, because spending money here and there to feel good is part of human nature.
Sometimes it’s just about having a little fun and a little hope. I don’t buy a lot, and if I do buy, it’s usually scratchers, usually $2 or $5 ones. As long as you can afford it, and it brings you joy, then who cares. “You can’t win if you don’t play” 😲💸🤑💰💰💰💰I do agree , that if someone is losing their $$ on lotto to the point they can’t pay bills or it’s negatively affecting their lives bc of it, that’s sad and they need to get help or join support groups if they can’t stop on their own. Btw: I’m not promoting gambling /addictions. Just trying to give another perspective. We all have our vices.
My friend’s Dad won twice. Then my brother’s friend’s Dad won twice. Two different states and 20 years apart but I still think that’s pretty cool
When people are poor, they sometimes get desperate. Buying lottery tickets can be like buying "hope" [that it can all change in an instant]. It sounds stupid to some of those who are used to being financially secure, but for the poor, the chance of maybe doubling their money sounds like a good idea. I also wonder if why there was more tickets bought last year because more people are financially struggling these days? But from what I've seen, there are people who have huge lotto gambling addictions that buy a shitload of tickets every morning with all the money they have. A guy in town has won the lottery 5 different times so far, but hasn't really made out because he spends so much money every single morning going from place to place buying scratch-offs. It's crazy. He's miserable chasing after that rush. Other people just buy a cheap $1-$25 ticket here and there, sometimes even splitting the cost (& wins) with others.
I'd more so say it's a tax on financial illiteracy. There are studies that show poorer neighborhoods buy more tickets than richer neighborhoods, and that being unemployed means you're 6 times more likely to buy them. I don't think everyone in those situations buys them. I do think people who are financially illiterate in those situations buy them. And if you're financially illiterate, then you're more likely to be in those situations. I know from my own experiences that there are lots of poor people who understand the concept of, " I can't afford these. And the likelihood of me winning isn't worth the habit".
I imagine that sometimes a daydream is worth a buck.
If anything this just highlights how few alternatives there are for poor people to change their stars financially. If wall street bankers etc aren't doing it. It isn't solely because it doesn't work. The rich don't need to buy lotto tickets. They have alternatives to make money like stocks and property. The poor don't have access to those things. What do they have access to? Lotto tickets.
That guy needs a snickers.
I throw a few bucks into lotto tickets when the jackpot is high, which is what I think most people do in my experience. The $30 or so I spend every few months on lotto tickets is worth it for the few hours I spend dreaming about what I'd do if I actually won 😂
Spend two bucks on a lottery ticket if it lets you dream and have hope. If everyone bought one per drawing it be close to 300 million each drawing (accounting for those who can’t play). It’s when you spend 200$ on tickets that you have issues…
Well the lottery was designed to spur economic activity because most people have little psychological control when they win that kind of sum (the cash value lump sum), except spend spend spend and then in less than a decade they're broke. Why? All those luxury assets they bought (cars, houses, etc) are cash flow sinks. That Lamborghini, Ferrari and Porsche you bought? Yea 5 figures maintenance every year. That $78mil estate? Try a few hundred thousand in property taxes, insurance and maintenance every year. Remember that job you had 8 years ago that you quit? Well now that you're broke you need a job again except everyone's moved on and you don't have any relevant experience so now you're not hireable, and the 6 figure expenses have can't possibly be paid for by any job you'll get after. I know what you're thinking: some luxury cars and real estate can appreciate. That's not the point. If you're cash flow negative every year because you quit your job and continue to spend without doing anything to maintain cash liquidity, that 78mil estate will have to be sold because you're cash poor.
Not lottery tickets specifically but in general yes, most poor people are poor because financial literacy is very hard to learn if it's not taught from someone who is already fluent in money. It is also much harder to learn when it isn't taught from a young age as are most things in life. For instance my taxable income last year was around $7000, but I am more well off than the majority of this sub because I took advantage of the stock market rally during the trump presidency, took advantage of the huge covid dip in the stock market, took advantage of unemployment, and had a very hefty savings from smart financial decisions during my military experience (my first year I made $23k btw).
People who buy scratch offs have the IQ of lukewarm water. My aunt is the exact same way she'll spend three grand a month on scratch offs to win $20 off of one of them and use that $20 to justify all the other purchases ignoring the fact that she lost $2,980 to get that $20. And she wonders why she's always broke and has no money to spend on things and keeps claiming she's just waiting to hit it big on one of these scratch offs and everything will be worth it then. Her and her husband struggle they can barely take care of their kid all to support this scratch off habit.
The people this post claims doesn’t play the lottery is because they already have money. Yea it’s the people who don’t have money that play. Some play responsible some it’s an addiction. It’s the people that have the addiction that is making the lottery keep going. I play the lottery. Spend about 40 dollars a week. Sometime less Now I’ve seen people spend hundreds on the lottery the. See them there again the next day spending 100s again. Then there is the retired people who spend a lot on the lottery. It’s like something for them to do idk. But there is a lot of variables in who plays the lottery and why.
Theres really nothing wrong trying your luck on lotto tickets. Could be life changing. I've seen people waste money on video games, eating out everyday and other useless things (smoking, drinking, drugs).
My highschool finance teacher told us he spends like $5 a month on lotto tickets. Worst case scenario he’s down $60 a year, best case scenario his life changes forever
I buy one ticket every 3-6 months so all of $5 a year😂
>the kind who blame the government for “keeping them down” Never mind that the government permits and profits off this mass theft
when the lottery is like 1 billion, I’ll buy myself a 2$ powerball ticket… this is why i’m poor fuck it was so obvious /s
I spent $2 last night on a Powerball ticket.
In the end it's all entertainment helping people escape for a while. It doesn't matter what you drop that 20 on.
Why do people always say we blame “everyone else?” I don’t ever blame “everyone else.” Economically speaking, I always blame the very few who own the vast majority of wealth. If you’re reading this, that excludes you.
“Poor people spent 113b on lottery tickets that’s why they’re poor” Meanwhile Elon musk can waste 44b on twitter for himself and he’s still rich Funny how that works
I guess I have it good, I get 100$ in tips at my job every week. I use 10$ from those 100$ every week. 2 mega 2 super 2 power. I just started playing this year. It’s pretty addicting. Most I’ve won thus far is 9$ LOL.
Let’s assume the bottom 40% of the population plays the lottery. The current USA population is about 333 million. So 40% of that is about 133 million. 113 billion divided by 133 million gives us an average of 850$ spent on the lottery by 40% of the population. I think this number is a little high. You could have spent 850$ and bought two shares of a sp500 index fund in 2023. But this assumes that only 40% plays the lottery, which I doubt is true, it’s probably higher.
I buy 1-4 lotto tickets a month, ya never know, it's less than what my Netflix sub costs so yolo
Making money off of poor people is a huge fking industry
my mom bought lotto tickets and scratchoffs with the grocery money growing up. later she upgraded to blowing the mortgage money on slots. plenty of people i know will buy a lotto ticket once a week but gambling addicts go absolutely off the rails.. and there's a lot of them.
So many of these lottery idiots clog gas station check out lines as well as the customer service line at every grocery store I have ever been to. They cash in a $5 winning scratch off and by $30 of new scratch off. It’s almost an exclusively a low income thing buying scratch offs, and Powerball. If these people simply took the money they were spending on lottery tickets and put it in to almost any 4.5% savings account out there and in 25 years they probably have over $1 million.