3 ms·
But that still says you shouldn’t :D > if you could afford to buy several hundred million tickets, the math says you should. I mean, unless you happen to be
by Semaphor 4y ago
But that still says you shouldn’t :D
> if you could afford to buy several hundred million tickets, the math says you should.
I mean, unless you happen to be filthy rich already.
- fny 4y agoThe article is wrong. You should still play if there's positive expectancy and the money you spent won't be missed (i.e. you won't be ruined.) See https://quantwolf.com/doc/powerball/powerball.html https://quantwolf.com/doc/powerball/powerball.html
- Semaphor 4y agoMy reading is different, it’s more "together with the kelly criterion or a weaker version of it, you can say it doesn’t matter if you do". This is still "eh maybe I’ll be lucky" and not "it’s mathematically sensible" because > What it means is that you would have to play the game for thousands of years with the jackpot being greater than 117 million each time in order to realize a positive expected return.
- okintheory 4y agoIf any expected value matters, it's utility, not wealth. If you think utility is linear in wealth, you need to check Jeff Bezos' instagram more.
- onion2k 4y agoThe key to getting rich and staying rich is figuring out how to risk other people's money. If you want to buy millions of lottery tickets, or launch a startup, or start a poker career, or anything really, it's far better to do it without risking your own security. Let other people invest in your venture for a reasonable return if you succeed, but also make sure you some non-trivial amount of equity for yourself so you make a killing if it's wildly successful. This is how most VC backed unicorns have worked. The early investors made a lot, but the founders who mostly only risked their time, energy, and opportunity-costed salary made far, far, far better returns.