Probably opening up myself for attack but I decided to keep track last year of all lottery playing, I quite enjoy playing the scratch off’s every Thursday and Saturday night, the Cash 5 every night and other draw games when I get the notion.
Losses
Scratch offs 2,390.00
Cash Five 426.00
Other Draw games 371.00
Out of area scratch and draw 127.00
Total 3,314.00
About 64.00 a week for the fun, and who knows.
Not a bad donation to the state treasury
It is great to have an activity that you enjoy
Just for giggles, for one month, why not try finding a needy family and see if you get as much enjoyment out of giving the money to them.
You might enjoy it more than the lottery, it may turn out to be a sure winner, every time!
You flushed over $3,000 down your toilet and did not even clog it up! What a waste of part of your hard-earned cash, after paying taxes and other expenses of employment. If you had invested that money into a low-cost stock ETF fund, you would already have more than you lost! Most likely your $3,314 would double to $6,628 in about 8 or 9 years.
I enjoy playing.
Comes to about a pack a day of cigarette habit (I don’t smoke) comes to about 9.08 a day, the average pack of cigarettes in my state is 9.54, and it doesn’t kill you.
I do give to the needy, in my state it benefits older citizens with property tax/rent rebates, transportation, prescriptions etc.
The other “needy” in my state are well compensated by Harrisburg trust me, they get plenty from me in taxes, plenty.
And who knows, lightning might strike.
That’s a good enough reason. Good luck…!
You can find much cheaper entertainment than your gambling addiction pretty much anywhere. For example, in January 2023, I paid $45 for a one-year membership to a site that would teach me Japanese vocabulary. I “played” every day, and have learned 2600 words (言葉) and almost 800 kanji (漢字). I’m far from fluent in Japanese, but I’m a lot closer than I was a year ago. And it only cost me $45. Of course, whenever I actually go to Japan, the trip will cost me more than you threw away on lottery tickets last year. So I guess if you need to somehow justify your daily wallet drain at the gas station as a good thing, you can say you’re saving money over what I’m doing.
“Activity” is quite a stretch.
I never tell other people how to spend their money.
[well, except for drugs]
Agreed. If someone is pissing away $$$ in lottery tickets and can’t eat or pay the mortgage (it could be $100/mo) then that’s a problem.
If someone uses a tiny part of their wealth to buy tickets, there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s no different then spending $3,300 on football season tickets
@Perpatriddle I would interested in seeing the number of winning tickets vs the total number bought.
Excellent example. I know people with expensive season tickets. And they probably drop another $100 at every game.
I’m a big fan but also have a big TV.
Don’t kid yourself. The well-known mathematical probability of you winning any given lottery is so small that you can gamble all your life and not ever win any significant amount. Do you enjoy beating your head against a concrete wall? Most addictions are like that. You know you should quit, but can’t. There are so many useful things that you could be doing instead.
Where are you gathering that the OP has an addicting ?
How do you know this? He said he enjoys it.
Less than 4% of my income.
I enjoy it.
My Mom got a 375.00 property tax rebate.
Roth IRA’s are fun too!
If you do a backdoor Roth, you can double the fun!
A wise man once said “YOU CAN’T LOSE IF YOU DON’T PLAY!”
True. The problem is poor people don’t know how to handle their lottery winning or gamble too much
Winning? I think most lose.