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I'm not sure lottery tickets increase your luck surface area. Its exchanging a sure loss in exchange for the remote possibility of a big win. The expected gain
by jonnycomputer 4y ago
I'm not sure lottery tickets increase your luck surface area. Its exchanging a sure loss in exchange for the remote possibility of a big win. The expected gain is negative. You pay 5 dollars for a lottery ticket (or whatever they cost these days), and that 5 dollars out of your pocket is an opportunity cost. Or let's put it this way:
Imagine that you drive your car for work, and the cost of being unable to repair your car is your job, maybe your house. Now, the chance on any given day that your car breaks down might be, say, 0.1%. Let's say a car repair costs $2000, and let's say you earn $100 in excess of expenses each day, and you have a choice of spending that $100 on 20 lottery tickets, or saving it for the day when your car breaks down. Without going through the tedious exercise of doing the math, it should be plain from common sense that buying lottery tickets--while it increases your luck surface area for winning the lottery--it also increases the probability that you will lose your job and your house...
- jonnycomputer 4y agoI think what I really was trying to say is that you can increase your luck surface in one area at the expense of decreasing your luck surface in another, e.g. by not being "lucky" enough to have sufficient funds to recover from a jam like a car break down. Like, just saving money for a rainy day fits the bill for increasing your luck surface.
- Cerium 4y agoLotto tickets increase your luck surface area at an (obviously) unattractive expense. For some people doing some of these activities may also increase their surface area at an unattractive expense.