The Powerball $600 million lottery just "ended" (actually, no winners
have yet been confirmed, thought he winning numbers have been
selected.)
I happened to be online to several
news-sources, to read the comments within minutes of the winning numbers
being posted. Numerous persons commented, "I didn't win." Others
commented, "I won! I won!" - clearly they did not. A few posted they
wish they would have bought a pizza instead - and several commented that
they wished the winners luck and hoped they would share the winnings.
I
don't get people who "buy" into lotteries. [I've read numerous
sociological or economic studies on those who do "play" so I do "get it"
in some way, even while I still do not comprehend it.]
For
one, the only genuine and guaranteed way in life, as shaped by years of
experience worldwide, to reap any harvest or gain on any achievement is
to sow & work and then reap a harvest in due time, hopefully of
ample yield. Long term, diligent, careful work, over time, can yield a
result.
What is more, the math of lotteries is
phenomenally and outrageously against the simple probability of
winning. Perhaps if I buy a raffle ticket from the local school, and I
have a 1-in-1000 to win, it's possible I might win the raffle, but I
have to remember I have a 999-in-1000 chance of not winning.
Maybe
I'm in a crowd of 15,000 at the local NBA game, and they toss out 20
shirts, I have a 1-in750 chance to grab a shirt (though even that is not
true - there are some seats in the arena that will never get a shirt!)
But, in this lottery a winner had a 1-in-175,000,000 chance of
winning. That means 174,999,999 people will not win!! That's the
probable number for persons who "played." A person thinking about
buying a ticket should have said to themselves, "If I buy this ticket, I
am 99.999999999 guaranteed to not win!"
At current
population rates - California has 38 million people and Texas 26 million
people. That means if I took 3x the population of California (every
city, every town, every neighborhood, every person!) and added to that
3x the population of Texas - from all of those persons, 1 of them will
win. 1! One! Only 1!
I don't get why anyone thinks they "have a chance" in any realistic way!
Meanwhile,
consider every person who paid $2.00 or $10.00 or $100.00 to buy a
ticket. The total value of tickets exceeds the $600 million given out -
and I would guess total sales revenue is closer to $1 Billion for this
lottery. Statistics I've read suggest that the powerball lottery alone
(not the various other scratch-offs and other forms of gambling that
exist) will gross over $5 billion this year.
If every
person who played these games of chance would instead contribute to
agencies performing acts of justice - we could give 1,000 agencies
$1,000,000 each. Or - we could give $2 million dollars to 500
agencies. We could fund $20 million dollars to 50 agencies!
Alas.
I didn't win the $600 million dollar Powerball lottery.
I didn't buy a ticket.
I
wish we lived in a society willing to "play" at acts of charity and the
transformative work of justice which could transform our world -
instead of "playing" on the nearly impossible chance to win a lottery.
Investment
in transformative justice could yield results that would yield returns
in predictable and sustainable ways to make our world better!
Toward
eupan ~
~ marty alan michelson, ph.d.
