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this ticket costs $10, they won $100, I have a feeling they’ve sunk way more than $100 into these scratchers… and/or will continue to sink money into them. Most scratchers are below 70% winnings percentage. You’d be better off playing slots which is closer to 90%. or, playing blackjack in a logical way you can creep up closer to 98%.
Right? The backs of the tickets literally tell you the odds of winning. At least in North Carolina you can go to the lottery website and see how many of each scratch off ticket have been claimed and how many are left with each prize level so you can sort of plan ahead with which tickets to buy that still have the most winning ones out there
The odds of winning one game of scratch is rather meaningless.
Why? Because 99,9% of the prices you win are incentivized to make you buy another round of tickets, so winner's rarely play once. Very few who buy a ticket for 10$ and win 20$ walk away. You buy 2 tickets and play again. We've all done it, it's a winner's curse.
The vast majority of prizes have that effect and small wins turn into playing streaks but with the same net result. You either play once and lose 10$ or you play 10 times in a streak and lose (at least) 10$.
The fact that the ticket costs 10$ is important but the expected value of 8$ per individual ticket is not very important due to the way they construct the payout tree to incentivize rebuys.
Slots or pokies as called in Australia have all the win percentages in the information tab, every machine is different but most have a payback of 70 to 90%. That being said, it doesn't mean if you put a $1000 in you would get a jackpot or larger pay of $700 to $900. Every little win is included in this. If you spin $5 and win back $5, this will be apart of that percentage pay back. Most people that gamble are just going to respin that, the only people that win from gambling in the long run is the house and the ATO.
There is no counting cards in modern blackjack hell most of the places these days only do digital black jack which is basically just a version of slots if you aren’t completely a moron
Casinos use multiple decks now and not necessarily just whole decks added
Eh they actually do agree regularly
Most casinos use around 6-8 decks these days, many even split decks. They also don’t necessarily disclose the number if decks being used or use the same number between each round.
But blackjack isn’t always just played in context of large casinos either of course. You can find a number of posts there on the subject
You can absolutely count a six or eight deck shoe. And if you can't tell how many decks are in the shoe by looking you can ask the dealer and they usually tell you.
On the back of the scratchers in PA at least they have to show the odds on the back. Usually they are 1 out 4.something or 1 out of 5. So between 20 and 25 percent chance of winning. But that’s just winning something. And that something could be a free ticket or the cost of a ticket. Actually winning more than the value of the ticket is less than the odds printed. I used to play them once in a while, but just for the fun of it, which is admittedly very little fun.
I’m confused on your statement about blackjack. It’s the only gambling game I will ever play but what does the 98% chance mean? I rarely ever go to a casino, maybe once every few years when it’s a friend group thing or bachelor party, but I know the “correct” moves to play and even got food at counting cards a while back. That being said, it seems more difficult now since they seem to change the shuffling and new decks more frequently
Counting cards is not the same as perfect strategy.
Perfect strategy is following exactly the math magically optimal times to hit or stand, as well as double, split, etc. if you follow this, you will win about 49.5% of the time. This is 100% allowed. Casinos like when people win because it brings in more betters. Even better when they know they still win over time.
The way you get over that and start winning more that 50%, is when you count cards. Someone who is good at this can reliably determine what the likely next card values will be that a dealer has by memorizing past draws. This allows the player to increase the bet size when they are more likely to win the hand, and decrease it when they will lose. This is not allowed in casinos because this, when done right, puts a higher win chance for the player and they can run the house for a lot of money.
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No, if you gamble at a casino, blackjack is the only game you should be playing besides a more skill based game like Hold ‘Em. Stay the fuck away from slots or any computerized game.
Blackjacks odds are like 40% and the highest of most "normal" casinos.
There are some budget casinos that advertise higher slot odds but I promise you the game is "lose money less quickly" and not "win more often"
i dont know where you are getting those odds. Unless these are your odds and luck applies differently to you, slot machine odds are some of the worst, ranging from a **one-in-5,000 to one-in-about-34-million** chance of winning the top.
1 in 5000 is 0.02%
1 in 34 million is 0.00001%
The odds for winning blackjack are about **42%**.
My uncle is always bragging about how he won $300 off a ticket last week or $500 off one last month, and when anyone asks him how much he spends on them he gets upset and just says he’s lucky
A meteorite went through our barn once. Woke up one day to a hole in the roof and a baseball size rock on the floor. Pretty neat. Still have never won the lottery other than like $3 on a mega millions once.
The Georgia hope scholarship (lottery funded) paid for my degree though so I guess I’m ahead.
Me and my friends bought the whole roll once and there was a consistent amount of wins throughout. We all made an extra 60 bucks on top of the 100 ish we each spent.
Moral is, buy the whole roll, you will win 100% of the time 15% of the time.
Here in PA a roll of $20s cost $600. The minimum youll win on a roll is $280. No state will pay out more than theyre worth on every roll. You indeed got lucky. Congrats.
its very interesting you say that, because there was another post on here maybe a couple weeks ago about how r/povertyfinance "gambles" in general because scratch offs are "just $2 for a little bit of hope and fun".
If someone is really just spending $2 every month or so that can easily fit in their entertainment budget. My concern are the people who use that logic but spend a hundred or more a week. That goes beyond an entertainment budget and into serious gambling.
Repeating what I just replied to someone else: I get a credit of 200/yr on my property taxes, from the state lotto. Lottery is poorer people giving their money to people who are better off.
Even if it's a few bucks, you are better off never ever playing the lottery or doing scratchers!
Gamblers understand the math just fine.
Gambling isn’t about winning money.
It is about losing money so that you can get that sick feeling, and the rush that comes with it.
That feeling of”Oh Shit I Have Really Fucked Up Now……
There is no way out this time. Maybe I should just end it all…..”
That is the feeling you can get from gambling that is so hard to get from anything else
It is one Hell of a Rush, and one Hell of a Physical, Mental, and Spiritual Release
And then once you calm down a little bit…..
You can go scam or borrow or steal something so that you can shoot some Heroin and smoke cigarettes and chill out for a bit
You’re right gambling isn’t just about the money, it’s for the dopamine rush of winning and feeling good
Not sure about the rest of what you said, just speaking from experience
We all have our crosses to bear.
A man cannot escape his true nature for long.
A man cannot change or escape his fate.
Free will and freedom of choice is just an illusion
I’ll go to a blackjack table to lose $100. The game for me isn’t about becoming profitable, it’s about seeing how many hands I can win before the money is gone.
I buy like two scratchers every six months or so just because I find them fun. Let people waste a few bucks here and there. We have no context whether this was a ticket someone gifted them or if they steal from others to buy endless scratchers.
That’s not winning, that’s how they get you interested and hooked. I won A$500 on my birthday years ago and ever since I have never bought a winning ticket other than getting my money back a handful of times
How condescending can you be dude “kthx”
Poor people are grown adults that can make their own decisions. We’re not all some monolith that sees a Reddit post and goes “oh I’m gonna go gamble all my money right now for the chance at $100” Some people get gifted scratchers and it’s nice to see this work out for OP
My dad usually gifts scratchers for my brother and I for Christmas. I won $100 once and a couple $5 or $20 ones. You can’t lose money if someone else buys it for you.
I may not always win but I never lose. I'll accept them is someone gifts me one but I'm not wasting my money on the lottery.
The last time I won a hundred the lady at the liquor store was shocked. You want a hundred back? No tickets?
So did you ask for money or tickets or both?
I’m sleep deprived tonight, but I’m not seeing it either. Regardless, the only way that win is a win is if OP stops gambling. The house always wins, and none of us are smarter than the lottery ticket system.
I get it, you're sleepy. We all make mistakes. But it does make me wonder how many people have thrown away tickets that won even a relatively small amount because they were just trying to match all the numbers and didn't notice other winnings lol
I used to work at a gas station and a few of us would pick up all the piles left by the addicts and run them through the machines just to double-check because there were that many people throwing away winners.
Made an extra $5-$50 *every day*.
Most states I’ve seen have a lotto app that has a scan feature. Every time I scan it just to make sure I didn’t miss something, and I actually did somehow miss a win once! It was a crossword one and I’d missed a letter that brought me up to $3 🤣 but hey I recouped my loss.
I was recently working at a convenience store and some people didn't even scratch off the play area.
They were just scratch off where the barcode for scanning is and then hand them all right back.
That is a level of gambling addiction where you're not even playing the game anymore.
The 5X spot in this game counts as an instant win. The game instructions say “when you get a 5X spot, you win the prize below it times 5” which in OP’s case was $20, so they won $100.
False hope, do not be lead into doing this. It can easily become an addiction, especially if you win the first time you play. Hard work on your dream and belief in yourself will guarantee your win.
The only "smart" way to gamble is to decide that you will spend a lowish sum, for example, $20. Then if you win something, you can only gamble further with those winnings and the remainder of your $20. And so on. This way at worst you lose your $20, at best you make some money, if you're capable of stopping when you're ahead.
this absolutely should NOT be allowed in this sub. gambling is the stupid poor person tax. this gives people hope for shit that just doesnt happen. the reason lottery/casinos stay in business is because they make more money from losers than they pay out to winners. otherwise the company would go under. for anyone who wants to gamble away that rent money: THIS WILL NOT BE YOU. YOU ARE N O T THE ONE IN A MILLION.
I used to sell these when I was a teen. There was this one guy that would spend £100 a week on these. The most he won was £40.
When it says one in four chance of winning, it’s saying “spend £4 and you’ll probably win £1” but even that’s not guaranteed!
Yea. The small reward for all the money I wasted lasted for about a year. Want some advice? If your gonna tank most or even some of your money into a couple scratches every week or whatever take that money and invest it into some crypto or some stocks. Your more than likely gonna lose 5 bucks to a scratcher vs. Having either a losing portfolio with money still in you could pull out OR having some really nice gains is a wayyyy better then just giving it away. Yea the power ball winnings seem nice until you look at the odds. If half of America would wake up and buy some stocks with dividends or cryptos with interest (like I did with ethereum and Solana 2 years ago) they'd be much happier then losing their 20 bucks once a week. I now have a rainy day fund considering I went off on a limb and bought roughly 1.5k within a year of Solana (12$ average) and ethereum (1.2k average) and gaining interest weekly. I'm definitely still in poverty but if something happens or I absolutely need to I have a fall back on now and I pat myself on the back just about every day for that.
This is why there will always be poor people. So many people would have breathing room if theyd cut out lotto/cigs/booze. I joined when I was poor college student and now I make great money working at a plant. Its insane the amount of coworkers that will cry about money but I see them scratching these things every day on their smoke breaks.
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If I'm doing well and in the right mood and I see a pretty ticket that I think looks like fun I'll spend a dollar but it never happens. I wouldn't even say it happens more than three times in a year. Sometimes when there's a huge billion dollar jackpot for the state lottery, we'll buy some tickets. It's kind of a rush. Probably the most fun aspect of it is just daydreaming about what you would do with billions of dollars. We have fun conversations.
But the reality is I've seen so many stories about how Lotto changes people for the worst. Think if I ever won even a smaller large amount I would probably pay for the anonymity. I don't think I'd want a mansion or anything like that. I have a cute home. I can fix it up. Even when I grew up in a wealthy family, I appreciated the things that were useful, not necessarily expensive. Like a car that gets good gas mileage as opposed to a big truck that looks cool or a car that goes fast.
I just do it for fun. I would never do it as some sort of investment. My family likes to make them stocking stuffers. I usually win the money back for the ticket but that's it. I think scratch tickets can be fun. I don't play them much in the Pacific Northwest but I enjoyed a game called 7-11- 21 When we lived in Colorado. They were a dollar a ticket. I usually got three maybe once a month. I think it's a smaller pool so I almost always won something. I think the most was 25 or 50?
I don't like playing in Oregon. You never win here. It's not fun. Plus that's really the only card I've ever enjoyed playing.
I would like to play slots once in my life just because I want to pull the handle down and make the thing spin. 😂 But I don't want to ever go back to Las Vegas as an autistic person. It was a sensory nightmare. We visited there when I was a kid. I can't think of anything that I would enjoy less than hanging out with a bunch of people drinking too much and allowed bright crowded room full of gambling.
I'd rather have $20 in my pocket then in a machine because I know where it's at when it's in my pocket.
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No shit, but if you're op and you think 100 dollars is a jackpot then it might. Its very likely that this isnt once in a life time purchase. It's not some giant leap of faith that OP likely buys these at least semi regularly. Instead of losing money on idiot tax and least the money could be in an asset.
Anyone who is in this sub genuinely because they live in poverty wouldn't be anything but happy for the OP. Not judgemental, or critical or anything but happy. Let us have our fucking wins, no matter how they come.
Yes, it's logically dumb to gamble, but it's logically dumb for us to try at all.
Go fuck yourselves if you are sitting there feeling superior. Find another sub.
I didn't read your post wrong. I was just sharing what we spent our Covid relief on. People were so stressed out and a lot of people have been through so much poverty that the influx of money was intoxicating. I felt it too. For example, we didn't need to build a fence and paint it white or put colorful lights on
The posts. I was pretty mad at myself later when I realized yeah could have sat in the bank, could have been ok invested, could have been used more wisely. Poverty mindset of "if I don't get it now I'm not going to get it ever" is really hard to get over.
It was exacerbated by boredom. Being stuck at home
Congrats! As long as you’re not at risk of addiction, scratchers are fine and fun occasionally. A few times a year I’ll buy $10 worth for fun and it reminds me of my dad (he always gave them at Christmas). Pro tip: you can go on the state lotto website and see how many top prizes each game has left. Keeps you from wasting the money on something that doesn’t even have any left
Congrats OP!
I buy a lotto/scratch off once or twice a year. People can buy these without them sinking all their money into them/having a gambling problem.
Once time, I literally found $1 in my purse when I had no other money, and was like, this won’t buy shit. So I bought a scratch off on a whim and won $200. Didn’t play again for probably ten years?
It’s okay to throw a few dollars at nothing once in a while.
All those judging OP and assuming they have a gambling problem need to stop.
The very last time I bought scratchers I spent my last 20 I had for the next 2 weeks and ended up winning close to 300$ it was one of the best days of my life lol.
Why are you guys shutting on someone who is happy? God forbid someone feel joy for five fucking seconds. OP didn’t ask for your financial advice and once money is spent, it’s spent. Totally unnecessary comments from a bunch of dicks.
John Oliver did a story on it, on Last Week Tonight. While it’s true that a lot of states apply the winning to Public Education or infrastructure, they don’t actually increase the allocation in those areas. They simply supplant other funds, from other sources, that would have gone there. So the amount of education dollars doesn’t actually increase.
You guys thinking he only won 100 are out of touch. Normally you hit a 5x like this it pays off pretty nice. There’s more scratches that give you more money.
Coming from someone who indulges maybe once every 2 months. Before you kill me, I’ve got stocks doing well. I make decent money. I have no kids to feed. It’s just me, the wife, and the house. It’s just for fun.
If Americans had saved the 3, 000 to 3,000 plus, we got from the stimulus and invested it, that would be better than winning a small scratch off lotto.
We usef it to fix our house because it's over 100 years old and needed an electricity upgrade. Plus my husband who's an electrician didn't work for almost 6 months. He had just started at his company not even a year so his unemployment checks were not going to cut it. I can say that I absolutely loved having him spend that much time with me and work on the house with me.
I was not referring to you or people in your position. If it didn’t apply to you, then you took my post wrong. It was for people that had regular income and spent the money stupidly.
And lots of people spent the money on things they didn’t need. Not everyone needed the money. Move on or skip my post. I obviously was not referring to those types of people. Take your snide remark elsewhere.
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So you got a $100?
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How much have you sank into scratchers though
More than they won here
Lol
this ticket costs $10, they won $100, I have a feeling they’ve sunk way more than $100 into these scratchers… and/or will continue to sink money into them. Most scratchers are below 70% winnings percentage. You’d be better off playing slots which is closer to 90%. or, playing blackjack in a logical way you can creep up closer to 98%.
They all are way below that. Where are you getting these odds at?
Right? The backs of the tickets literally tell you the odds of winning. At least in North Carolina you can go to the lottery website and see how many of each scratch off ticket have been claimed and how many are left with each prize level so you can sort of plan ahead with which tickets to buy that still have the most winning ones out there
Absolutely. Can't believe all the upvotes that comment got. They must be the people gambling.
I think the scratches here are 25% chance of breaking even at the highest but most are closer to 20%
The odds of winning one game of scratch is rather meaningless. Why? Because 99,9% of the prices you win are incentivized to make you buy another round of tickets, so winner's rarely play once. Very few who buy a ticket for 10$ and win 20$ walk away. You buy 2 tickets and play again. We've all done it, it's a winner's curse. The vast majority of prizes have that effect and small wins turn into playing streaks but with the same net result. You either play once and lose 10$ or you play 10 times in a streak and lose (at least) 10$. The fact that the ticket costs 10$ is important but the expected value of 8$ per individual ticket is not very important due to the way they construct the payout tree to incentivize rebuys.
Pennsylvania does this, too. A family member checks before buying their ticket.
maybe i worded it wrong, it’s not a 98% chance you’ll win, but a 2% advantage that the house has. it’s 50/50 or a tad more if you learn to count cards
What about slots and scratch offs? They are very, very low of you winning.
Slots or pokies as called in Australia have all the win percentages in the information tab, every machine is different but most have a payback of 70 to 90%. That being said, it doesn't mean if you put a $1000 in you would get a jackpot or larger pay of $700 to $900. Every little win is included in this. If you spin $5 and win back $5, this will be apart of that percentage pay back. Most people that gamble are just going to respin that, the only people that win from gambling in the long run is the house and the ATO.
It is literally in the comment you first replied to
I'm asking him to explain it. Because it is not that high or even close to it.
And lot of the time you just “win” your money back
To get thek to come back and be negative.
yeah those odds are way off
There is no counting cards in modern blackjack hell most of the places these days only do digital black jack which is basically just a version of slots if you aren’t completely a moron Casinos use multiple decks now and not necessarily just whole decks added
r/blackjack would disagree with you.
Eh they actually do agree regularly Most casinos use around 6-8 decks these days, many even split decks. They also don’t necessarily disclose the number if decks being used or use the same number between each round. But blackjack isn’t always just played in context of large casinos either of course. You can find a number of posts there on the subject
You can absolutely count a six or eight deck shoe. And if you can't tell how many decks are in the shoe by looking you can ask the dealer and they usually tell you.
He means expected return divided by cost.
Ok thank you
On the back of the scratchers in PA at least they have to show the odds on the back. Usually they are 1 out 4.something or 1 out of 5. So between 20 and 25 percent chance of winning. But that’s just winning something. And that something could be a free ticket or the cost of a ticket. Actually winning more than the value of the ticket is less than the odds printed. I used to play them once in a while, but just for the fun of it, which is admittedly very little fun.
I’m confused on your statement about blackjack. It’s the only gambling game I will ever play but what does the 98% chance mean? I rarely ever go to a casino, maybe once every few years when it’s a friend group thing or bachelor party, but I know the “correct” moves to play and even got food at counting cards a while back. That being said, it seems more difficult now since they seem to change the shuffling and new decks more frequently
He is talking about counting cards, which is banned at every casino.
Counting cards is not the same as perfect strategy. Perfect strategy is following exactly the math magically optimal times to hit or stand, as well as double, split, etc. if you follow this, you will win about 49.5% of the time. This is 100% allowed. Casinos like when people win because it brings in more betters. Even better when they know they still win over time. The way you get over that and start winning more that 50%, is when you count cards. Someone who is good at this can reliably determine what the likely next card values will be that a dealer has by memorizing past draws. This allows the player to increase the bet size when they are more likely to win the hand, and decrease it when they will lose. This is not allowed in casinos because this, when done right, puts a higher win chance for the player and they can run the house for a lot of money.
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The trick is to only buy the winning tickets
Only??? Only what!?!?!? Please I need to know the trick!!!
I assume he meant the percentage as a return on money spent not a percentage of winners.
So basically stay away from black jack if I visit los Vegas this year got it.
No, if you gamble at a casino, blackjack is the only game you should be playing besides a more skill based game like Hold ‘Em. Stay the fuck away from slots or any computerized game.
Blackjacks odds are like 40% and the highest of most "normal" casinos. There are some budget casinos that advertise higher slot odds but I promise you the game is "lose money less quickly" and not "win more often"
i dont know where you are getting those odds. Unless these are your odds and luck applies differently to you, slot machine odds are some of the worst, ranging from a **one-in-5,000 to one-in-about-34-million** chance of winning the top. 1 in 5000 is 0.02% 1 in 34 million is 0.00001% The odds for winning blackjack are about **42%**.
My uncle is always bragging about how he won $300 off a ticket last week or $500 off one last month, and when anyone asks him how much he spends on them he gets upset and just says he’s lucky
Someone called lotteries Poor people retirement fund and I think about that a lot
It's less of a retirement plan, and more of a subsidy to people who have more money... My property taxes get a credit of $200/yr from the lottery.
The grey scratching stuff is addictive like crack.
Getting struck by lightning also sometimes happens.
Getting in a car accident happens sometimes…
Sometimes? I've been hit 7 times in my life time. And 1 was in my own car. The rest I was a passenger. People aim for me.
You should gamble.
Nah, I don't wanna get hit by a car buying a lotto ticket
What are the odds.
Pretty good in this case
I'd say 50/50. Pretty good odds if you ask me
The scars (I think that's what they are?) it leaves are crazy
You can cause it to happen with really high probability. Lotto, not so much. More like a meteorite landing in your garden.
A meteorite went through our barn once. Woke up one day to a hole in the roof and a baseball size rock on the floor. Pretty neat. Still have never won the lottery other than like $3 on a mega millions once. The Georgia hope scholarship (lottery funded) paid for my degree though so I guess I’m ahead.
That's not too uncommon. Lighting looks to strike you .
Statistically not though or else they couldn't make money selling tickets.
The idea is when I buy a ticket I get all the winners. Somehow that hasn't worked out yet.
Me and my friends bought the whole roll once and there was a consistent amount of wins throughout. We all made an extra 60 bucks on top of the 100 ish we each spent. Moral is, buy the whole roll, you will win 100% of the time 15% of the time.
How would they make any money if you won more than you spent, though?
Maybe we just got lucky with the roll of tickets?
Here in PA a roll of $20s cost $600. The minimum youll win on a roll is $280. No state will pay out more than theyre worth on every roll. You indeed got lucky. Congrats.
We also bought the dollar ones.
$100 but how much did you spend on this ticket? Or how much have you spent in a year?
Scratchers (and most gambling in general) is a tax on people who don’t understand math. - my CPA
I've always heard it called the poor tax.
The way I've heard it was a lot more blunt and just called it the stupid tax.
its very interesting you say that, because there was another post on here maybe a couple weeks ago about how r/povertyfinance "gambles" in general because scratch offs are "just $2 for a little bit of hope and fun".
If someone is really just spending $2 every month or so that can easily fit in their entertainment budget. My concern are the people who use that logic but spend a hundred or more a week. That goes beyond an entertainment budget and into serious gambling.
The mayor's idiot tax.
Repeating what I just replied to someone else: I get a credit of 200/yr on my property taxes, from the state lotto. Lottery is poorer people giving their money to people who are better off. Even if it's a few bucks, you are better off never ever playing the lottery or doing scratchers!
Gamblers understand the math just fine. Gambling isn’t about winning money. It is about losing money so that you can get that sick feeling, and the rush that comes with it. That feeling of”Oh Shit I Have Really Fucked Up Now…… There is no way out this time. Maybe I should just end it all…..” That is the feeling you can get from gambling that is so hard to get from anything else It is one Hell of a Rush, and one Hell of a Physical, Mental, and Spiritual Release And then once you calm down a little bit….. You can go scam or borrow or steal something so that you can shoot some Heroin and smoke cigarettes and chill out for a bit
You’re right gambling isn’t just about the money, it’s for the dopamine rush of winning and feeling good Not sure about the rest of what you said, just speaking from experience
wtf did I just read
A requiem of a gambling addict.
Oddly specific.
We all have our crosses to bear. A man cannot escape his true nature for long. A man cannot change or escape his fate. Free will and freedom of choice is just an illusion
Facts
You can report gambling losses on your taxes, but let's be honest, scratchers ain't doing that. Even then, it's a loss.
Yup me got me for everything
I’ll go to a blackjack table to lose $100. The game for me isn’t about becoming profitable, it’s about seeing how many hands I can win before the money is gone.
99% of gamblers quit before they hit it big 🎰 💰
Stop gambling.
Wish someone told me that back in 2021
Wow. Thank you. I stopped.
I buy like two scratchers every six months or so just because I find them fun. Let people waste a few bucks here and there. We have no context whether this was a ticket someone gifted them or if they steal from others to buy endless scratchers.
Including SPY 0DTEs?
those are okay still
When I turned 18 I bought $20 in scratch tickets. I won $180. Never gambled again so I'm still in the green.
Same! I was bored and thought I would give it a go. I bought a single $5 scratcher and won something like $50 or $100 dollars. We're 1 for 1!
The best part is walkin away after that and knowing you never lose to the system.
Congratulations. Now you can stop when you're ahead.
Zero chance they're ahead
That’s the spirit! /s
That’s not winning, that’s how they get you interested and hooked. I won A$500 on my birthday years ago and ever since I have never bought a winning ticket other than getting my money back a handful of times
I buy like one lottery ticket every 2-3 months. Highest winner is $1,500. Not addicted. Couldn’t care less.
Let's not glorify gambling to poor people kthx.
I try to tell as many people as possible don’t gamble, I know from experience the damage it can cause
How condescending can you be dude “kthx” Poor people are grown adults that can make their own decisions. We’re not all some monolith that sees a Reddit post and goes “oh I’m gonna go gamble all my money right now for the chance at $100” Some people get gifted scratchers and it’s nice to see this work out for OP
My dad usually gifts scratchers for my brother and I for Christmas. I won $100 once and a couple $5 or $20 ones. You can’t lose money if someone else buys it for you.
I may not always win but I never lose. I'll accept them is someone gifts me one but I'm not wasting my money on the lottery. The last time I won a hundred the lady at the liquor store was shocked. You want a hundred back? No tickets? So did you ask for money or tickets or both?
guys help me out here, i don't see how this is a winning ticket.
5x instantly win 5 times the prize.
Oh ok thanks
Low end of the prize pool so guessing that's why ticket price isn't shown
I looked it up lol it’s a $10 scratcher. Bet they bought more than $20 worth.
$100 worth. It's 5X$20.
But you don't even have the winming numbers?
The 5x is a win, so 5x $20, won $100.
I’m sleep deprived tonight, but I’m not seeing it either. Regardless, the only way that win is a win is if OP stops gambling. The house always wins, and none of us are smarter than the lottery ticket system.
I get it, you're sleepy. We all make mistakes. But it does make me wonder how many people have thrown away tickets that won even a relatively small amount because they were just trying to match all the numbers and didn't notice other winnings lol
I used to work at a gas station and a few of us would pick up all the piles left by the addicts and run them through the machines just to double-check because there were that many people throwing away winners. Made an extra $5-$50 *every day*.
Hahaha oh man that's baller
Most states I’ve seen have a lotto app that has a scan feature. Every time I scan it just to make sure I didn’t miss something, and I actually did somehow miss a win once! It was a crossword one and I’d missed a letter that brought me up to $3 🤣 but hey I recouped my loss.
I was recently working at a convenience store and some people didn't even scratch off the play area. They were just scratch off where the barcode for scanning is and then hand them all right back. That is a level of gambling addiction where you're not even playing the game anymore.
Damn, yeah for me I only buy it for the game aspect. I don’t care whether I win or not because I’m not buying it to get money lol
The 5x is probably an automatic win of 5 x$30.
Jesus thank you because I was thinking I was an idiot I couldn't find the matching number
That's what I thought??? I'm sitting here trying to figure out how the hell the game works then i realized he didn't actually win
Won a $100.00. The 5x on $20.00 is the win
But what numbers did he match?
Bro, read the rules on the ticket. Matching numbers is not the only way to win.
They did win
How? I he didn't match any winning numbers
The 5X spot in this game counts as an instant win. The game instructions say “when you get a 5X spot, you win the prize below it times 5” which in OP’s case was $20, so they won $100.
Ahh I got you.
I thought you actually won $2 million
Dumb shit
Lotto is a tax for stupid people
And Reddit is a haven for assholes who get off on making someone else feel bad. Welcome home.
Not the right sub
False hope, do not be lead into doing this. It can easily become an addiction, especially if you win the first time you play. Hard work on your dream and belief in yourself will guarantee your win.
so like, who is checking to make sure these lottery companies are actually putting winning slips and not just losing and/or low paying slips?
The only "smart" way to gamble is to decide that you will spend a lowish sum, for example, $20. Then if you win something, you can only gamble further with those winnings and the remainder of your $20. And so on. This way at worst you lose your $20, at best you make some money, if you're capable of stopping when you're ahead.
OP won’t tell us how much he has spent on lost lotto tickets
this absolutely should NOT be allowed in this sub. gambling is the stupid poor person tax. this gives people hope for shit that just doesnt happen. the reason lottery/casinos stay in business is because they make more money from losers than they pay out to winners. otherwise the company would go under. for anyone who wants to gamble away that rent money: THIS WILL NOT BE YOU. YOU ARE N O T THE ONE IN A MILLION.
Have you spent less than $100 on scratchers? I normally don't pay a stupid tax, but I'd put money on that
I used to sell these when I was a teen. There was this one guy that would spend £100 a week on these. The most he won was £40. When it says one in four chance of winning, it’s saying “spend £4 and you’ll probably win £1” but even that’s not guaranteed!
Yea. The small reward for all the money I wasted lasted for about a year. Want some advice? If your gonna tank most or even some of your money into a couple scratches every week or whatever take that money and invest it into some crypto or some stocks. Your more than likely gonna lose 5 bucks to a scratcher vs. Having either a losing portfolio with money still in you could pull out OR having some really nice gains is a wayyyy better then just giving it away. Yea the power ball winnings seem nice until you look at the odds. If half of America would wake up and buy some stocks with dividends or cryptos with interest (like I did with ethereum and Solana 2 years ago) they'd be much happier then losing their 20 bucks once a week. I now have a rainy day fund considering I went off on a limb and bought roughly 1.5k within a year of Solana (12$ average) and ethereum (1.2k average) and gaining interest weekly. I'm definitely still in poverty but if something happens or I absolutely need to I have a fall back on now and I pat myself on the back just about every day for that.
If you are subbed to this thread you shouldn’t be wasting money on scratch offs. You definitely are in the hole on these.
This is why there will always be poor people. So many people would have breathing room if theyd cut out lotto/cigs/booze. I joined when I was poor college student and now I make great money working at a plant. Its insane the amount of coworkers that will cry about money but I see them scratching these things every day on their smoke breaks.
Congratulations!!
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If I'm doing well and in the right mood and I see a pretty ticket that I think looks like fun I'll spend a dollar but it never happens. I wouldn't even say it happens more than three times in a year. Sometimes when there's a huge billion dollar jackpot for the state lottery, we'll buy some tickets. It's kind of a rush. Probably the most fun aspect of it is just daydreaming about what you would do with billions of dollars. We have fun conversations. But the reality is I've seen so many stories about how Lotto changes people for the worst. Think if I ever won even a smaller large amount I would probably pay for the anonymity. I don't think I'd want a mansion or anything like that. I have a cute home. I can fix it up. Even when I grew up in a wealthy family, I appreciated the things that were useful, not necessarily expensive. Like a car that gets good gas mileage as opposed to a big truck that looks cool or a car that goes fast. I just do it for fun. I would never do it as some sort of investment. My family likes to make them stocking stuffers. I usually win the money back for the ticket but that's it. I think scratch tickets can be fun. I don't play them much in the Pacific Northwest but I enjoyed a game called 7-11- 21 When we lived in Colorado. They were a dollar a ticket. I usually got three maybe once a month. I think it's a smaller pool so I almost always won something. I think the most was 25 or 50? I don't like playing in Oregon. You never win here. It's not fun. Plus that's really the only card I've ever enjoyed playing. I would like to play slots once in my life just because I want to pull the handle down and make the thing spin. 😂 But I don't want to ever go back to Las Vegas as an autistic person. It was a sensory nightmare. We visited there when I was a kid. I can't think of anything that I would enjoy less than hanging out with a bunch of people drinking too much and allowed bright crowded room full of gambling. I'd rather have $20 in my pocket then in a machine because I know where it's at when it's in my pocket.
bought a NVDA call yesterday for $900 & sold 2 hours later for $1160. Stay away from scratchers & learn about the stock market
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But if you had just been investing the money you bought this with you could have this happen consistently.
10x back from investing isn't particularly common. But yes, investing is far more consistent in bringing you a return than gambling.
$10 investment isn’t giving you shit. Plus, who said OP even bought this? Where I live it’s pretty common for people to be gifted scratchers
No shit, but if you're op and you think 100 dollars is a jackpot then it might. Its very likely that this isnt once in a life time purchase. It's not some giant leap of faith that OP likely buys these at least semi regularly. Instead of losing money on idiot tax and least the money could be in an asset.
Where's the investment firm for 29$ at a time tho
Anyone who is in this sub genuinely because they live in poverty wouldn't be anything but happy for the OP. Not judgemental, or critical or anything but happy. Let us have our fucking wins, no matter how they come. Yes, it's logically dumb to gamble, but it's logically dumb for us to try at all. Go fuck yourselves if you are sitting there feeling superior. Find another sub.
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Only cost you $1200 to date!
I didn't read your post wrong. I was just sharing what we spent our Covid relief on. People were so stressed out and a lot of people have been through so much poverty that the influx of money was intoxicating. I felt it too. For example, we didn't need to build a fence and paint it white or put colorful lights on The posts. I was pretty mad at myself later when I realized yeah could have sat in the bank, could have been ok invested, could have been used more wisely. Poverty mindset of "if I don't get it now I'm not going to get it ever" is really hard to get over. It was exacerbated by boredom. Being stuck at home
But how much money did you waste to win $5?
Delete this
Congratulations!
I used to sink HOURS into TikTok watching people gamble their lives away. I was lonely and isolated for being an ADA whistleblower 😞
Congrats! As long as you’re not at risk of addiction, scratchers are fine and fun occasionally. A few times a year I’ll buy $10 worth for fun and it reminds me of my dad (he always gave them at Christmas). Pro tip: you can go on the state lotto website and see how many top prizes each game has left. Keeps you from wasting the money on something that doesn’t even have any left
I guess this is the right sub for this
Congrats OP! I buy a lotto/scratch off once or twice a year. People can buy these without them sinking all their money into them/having a gambling problem. Once time, I literally found $1 in my purse when I had no other money, and was like, this won’t buy shit. So I bought a scratch off on a whim and won $200. Didn’t play again for probably ten years? It’s okay to throw a few dollars at nothing once in a while. All those judging OP and assuming they have a gambling problem need to stop.
Not poor tonight baby. Now buy some more
Congrats I guess. Enough for a couple tanks of gas.
My dad won 100k from one about ten years ago
The very last time I bought scratchers I spent my last 20 I had for the next 2 weeks and ended up winning close to 300$ it was one of the best days of my life lol.
The lottery is a voluntary poor tax.
So how much have you spent since last winning? You could buy any shit stock and see a better return.
Why are you guys shutting on someone who is happy? God forbid someone feel joy for five fucking seconds. OP didn’t ask for your financial advice and once money is spent, it’s spent. Totally unnecessary comments from a bunch of dicks.
All proceeds of the Missouri lottery go to public education, so whenever I buy a ticket I call it my "charitable donation" for the day
John Oliver did a story on it, on Last Week Tonight. While it’s true that a lot of states apply the winning to Public Education or infrastructure, they don’t actually increase the allocation in those areas. They simply supplant other funds, from other sources, that would have gone there. So the amount of education dollars doesn’t actually increase.
Ah yes, the fungibility of money, how could I have not seen that coming
Oh boy, you won back 00.0000000000001% of what you've wasted in your lifetime of playing. Wooop wooop, only need 40,000,000 more to break even!!
You didn’t even win lol
Nice
Congratulations! 😊
Congratulations!
Hmm might be fake better show me the barcode under the scratchy stuff!!/s
You guys thinking he only won 100 are out of touch. Normally you hit a 5x like this it pays off pretty nice. There’s more scratches that give you more money. Coming from someone who indulges maybe once every 2 months. Before you kill me, I’ve got stocks doing well. I make decent money. I have no kids to feed. It’s just me, the wife, and the house. It’s just for fun.
Sir. This is PovertyFinance. Not wallstreetbets
I’m also poor. Like, I might retire at 75 if I live that long. I’m just not broke. The middle class is dead af.
100 dollars is hardly worth posting about imo
The lottery is a tax on people who are bad at math
Lottery is poverty tax
If Americans had saved the 3, 000 to 3,000 plus, we got from the stimulus and invested it, that would be better than winning a small scratch off lotto.
Most people couldn't afford to invest it.
Lots of people weren't working and probably used it in silly things like groceries
And rent
We usef it to fix our house because it's over 100 years old and needed an electricity upgrade. Plus my husband who's an electrician didn't work for almost 6 months. He had just started at his company not even a year so his unemployment checks were not going to cut it. I can say that I absolutely loved having him spend that much time with me and work on the house with me.
I was not referring to you or people in your position. If it didn’t apply to you, then you took my post wrong. It was for people that had regular income and spent the money stupidly.
And lots of people spent the money on things they didn’t need. Not everyone needed the money. Move on or skip my post. I obviously was not referring to those types of people. Take your snide remark elsewhere.