6 ms·

My best friend's husband is always bringing home winning $20 or $50 lotto tickets. His family can't afford the $75 a week he spends on those, but every gas sta

My best friend's husband is always bringing home winning $20 or $50 lotto tickets. His family can't afford the $75 a week he spends on those, but every gas station sells them. Even not-out-of-control cases are harmful.

bergenty 4y ago
Cardboard crack
- flappyeagle 4y ago
  Ban Magic
  - djbusby 4y ago
    Pogs? Beanie Babies? Cabbage Patch? Garbage Pail Kids?
    - MichaelCollins 4y ago
      Nothing of value would be lost if you banned all the cheap mass produced crap designed from the onset to be ""collectible.""
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
googlryas 4y ago
Technically he's only spending $25-55/week! I wonder if cases like this could be helped if he was introduced to those "savings-with-lottery-features" apps. I'll say longgame.co as an example(I've never used it and am not vouching for it, I know there are others out there as well) It's really a shame. If he put that $50/week into a savings acct, that would be $2500 at the end of the year, which could pay for a nice week-long vacation for the family if they wanted to spend it on fun stuff and not reducing debt and other non-fun stuff.
- njarboe 4y ago
  Governments should run gambling at even odds. Then your gambling is a bit like saving. You put in money each week and every once in a while you get a big payoff, but you are net even. Most current state lotteries have worse odds than the mafia numbers games they replaced.
  - cykros 4y ago
    If you're going to require even odds, then governments should very much stay out of gambling all together; I don't want tax dollars going to the overhead costs of running what ultimately will amount to an otherwise net-neutral endeavor. Now, perhaps if you have the stores that sell lottery tickets footing that bill as a way of driving up traffic to their stores, I could see a case for this system existing. Still strange for the government I imagine, but I have seen bars use this sort of "no profit" gambling game just as a way to keep regulars coming. Pay $1 to roll 5 dice, if you get a yahtzee, you win whatever's in the pot (which is comprised of other folks' pay-ins), and perhaps things like 3 of a kind to get a second roll, full house to get a second roll free, etc. At the end of the day, the bar makes nothing, but it serves to habituate people going to THAT bar to grab their after work beer. Totally illegal where I've seen it, but likewise, not really hazardous enough for anyone to bat an eye about it either (the lotto machine or the booze itself was clearly the bigger vice).
poink 4y ago
In Florida, if you go to any regional lottery office on payday, you will see people come in, cash their paycheck at the window, convert every dollar into scratch-off tickets, then see if they actually got paid that week. That's a government office doing that.
- chrisweekly 4y ago
  They say "the lottery is a tax on people who can't do math". I'd vote for using lottery revenue to fund public STEM education.
- pleb_nz 4y ago
  You're speaking figuratively right when you say paycheck. People in the US don't actually still get a physical paycheck right?
  - zip1234 4y ago
    Some do. Plenty of people don't even have a bank account so they use a check cashing place.
    - effingwewt 4y ago
      Some places still actively refuse to allow DD. I once had an BoA, on two occasions in a row, hold my payroll checks. I had a BoA acct and so did my employer. For some reason I could cash my check, deposit the cash in my acct and have it be there immediately. But if I deposited the check it would be held. Come to find out my employer did this constantly, on purpose, to give themselves more time to pay workers. Owner lived on 5+ acres of prime land in Albuquerque, had another property in Santa Fe, and bled money and showed off with his company-name-painted year-of pace-car corvette... but pled poverty come payday. American employers are a different kind of sociopathic leech.
      - bawolff 4y ago
        This doesn't make sense. Admittedly im in canada, so maybe its different - but holds are to protect the bank not the person who wrote the cheque. There wouldn't really be a benefit to the cheque writer here.

bergenty 4y ago

Cardboard crack

flappyeagle 4y ago
Ban Magic
- djbusby 4y ago
  Pogs? Beanie Babies? Cabbage Patch? Garbage Pail Kids?
  - MichaelCollins 4y ago
    Nothing of value would be lost if you banned all the cheap mass produced crap designed from the onset to be ""collectible.""

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

googlryas 4y ago

Technically he's only spending $25-55/week! I wonder if cases like this could be helped if he was introduced to those "savings-with-lottery-features" apps. I'll say longgame.co as an example(I've never used it and am not vouching for it, I know there are others out there as well) It's really a shame. If he put that $50/week into a savings acct, that would be $2500 at the end of the year, which could pay for a nice week-long vacation for the family if they wanted to spend it on fun stuff and not reducing debt and other non-fun stuff.

njarboe 4y ago
Governments should run gambling at even odds. Then your gambling is a bit like saving. You put in money each week and every once in a while you get a big payoff, but you are net even. Most current state lotteries have worse odds than the mafia numbers games they replaced.
- cykros 4y ago
  If you're going to require even odds, then governments should very much stay out of gambling all together; I don't want tax dollars going to the overhead costs of running what ultimately will amount to an otherwise net-neutral endeavor. Now, perhaps if you have the stores that sell lottery tickets footing that bill as a way of driving up traffic to their stores, I could see a case for this system existing. Still strange for the government I imagine, but I have seen bars use this sort of "no profit" gambling game just as a way to keep regulars coming. Pay $1 to roll 5 dice, if you get a yahtzee, you win whatever's in the pot (which is comprised of other folks' pay-ins), and perhaps things like 3 of a kind to get a second roll, full house to get a second roll free, etc. At the end of the day, the bar makes nothing, but it serves to habituate people going to THAT bar to grab their after work beer. Totally illegal where I've seen it, but likewise, not really hazardous enough for anyone to bat an eye about it either (the lotto machine or the booze itself was clearly the bigger vice).

poink 4y ago

In Florida, if you go to any regional lottery office on payday, you will see people come in, cash their paycheck at the window, convert every dollar into scratch-off tickets, then see if they actually got paid that week. That's a government office doing that.

chrisweekly 4y ago
They say "the lottery is a tax on people who can't do math". I'd vote for using lottery revenue to fund public STEM education.
pleb_nz 4y ago
You're speaking figuratively right when you say paycheck. People in the US don't actually still get a physical paycheck right?
- zip1234 4y ago
  Some do. Plenty of people don't even have a bank account so they use a check cashing place.
  - effingwewt 4y ago
    Some places still actively refuse to allow DD. I once had an BoA, on two occasions in a row, hold my payroll checks. I had a BoA acct and so did my employer. For some reason I could cash my check, deposit the cash in my acct and have it be there immediately. But if I deposited the check it would be held. Come to find out my employer did this constantly, on purpose, to give themselves more time to pay workers. Owner lived on 5+ acres of prime land in Albuquerque, had another property in Santa Fe, and bled money and showed off with his company-name-painted year-of pace-car corvette... but pled poverty come payday. American employers are a different kind of sociopathic leech.
    - bawolff 4y ago
      This doesn't make sense. Admittedly im in canada, so maybe its different - but holds are to protect the bank not the person who wrote the cheque. There wouldn't really be a benefit to the cheque writer here.