Have you ever thought about winning the lottery before? If so, how old were you and why did you want to win? You may imagine winning the lottery and have a specific plan to use that money for, sadly it could just end up somewhere else. Fantasizing about winning the lottery can be fun and all, but that is not usually how it works. Some people don’t even fantasize about winning the lottery. Imagine when you were back in sixth grade, your class made a little booklet about your future if you would ever win the lottery or over a million dollars.
You may choose to give some money to families that couldn’t afford things for their children, take trips around the world to site see with your family, and or buy something new like a house or car. Even after sixth grade, you still may be nineteen and want to win the lottery. Continue wishing that you want to win the lottery, you may just get lucky some day! This essay will contain talking about the general concepts and the advantages and disadvantages of the lottery.
What is the lottery? The meaning of lottery is the means of raising money by selling numbered tickets and giving prizes to the holders of numbers drawn at random or also known as a process or thing whose success or outcome is governed by chance (Google). The population in the United States is 307 million people. In that 307 million people, two thirds of the United States population are participating and competing against you in the lottery ***(Quilty/MoneyCrashers).
In some states, the state lottery is not available. Alabama, Alaska, Wyoming, Hawaii, Mississippi, Utah, and Nevada are states that lottery tickets aren’t sold in (Isidore/CNNMoney). These seven states do not participate in lottery tickets because they have casinos that are more attractive and can win more money in a couple of hours than a regular convenience store buy. With this, state-run lottery does not want to compete with casinos that are more tourist essential. They also don’t participate because of the funds of collecting money are difficult **(Isidore/CNN Money).
While some may think that a lottery ticket is an efficient way to increase their wealth, sadly this is not the case with lottery tickets. Lottery tickets do not help increase your wealth by any means, but it is a fun way to try to win. Miranda Marquit states that 21% of all American consider winning the lottery is an important wealth building strategy. In a more general perspective, Americans spend close to $70 million on lottery tickets for a year. According to multiple studies, about 70% of all lottery winners end up going broke and file for bankruptcy (Gaille). An example of it happening is when Jay Sommers won one-fifth of a $28.9 million jackpot in Michigan and spent the first annual check of $290,000 to buy five automobiles.
After this occurrence, he hired a shady financial advisor who just happened to be his friend, him tricked him out of the rest of his winnings. Jay lost all his winnings and resorted to delivering pizzas (MoneyCrashers/ Quilty). If this were you, how would you feel if your friend tricked you of all the money that you just won? Sadly, these types of situations happen to occur quite often to different people if they aren’t careful. When listening to the news about lottery ticket winnings, they always interview the person on how they feel about the money that they just won or what they are going to do with it. In this case, most people say that they will go buy a new house, car or something else that may be costlier. After all, those people just won probably over a million dollars.
In competing in lottery tickets, there is a winning strategy. This strategy includes buying 39 tickets because the odds of you winning with a couple tickets are very slim. With buying 39 tickets, you have a bit more chance to win something smaller like three or more dollars depending on what your state offers. On the bright side, a portion of the money that the lottery gives out goes towards education, children’s programs, city things for such things as transportation, textbooks or even roadways. In Kansas, the money is forwarded to the National Guard for scholarships, 30 percent to veteran’s homes fund, and another 30 percent goes to veterans enhanced service delivery program (KSLottery). In a way, this is a cool way to help give back to those who have provided us with these experiences like being about to participate in these types of fun things. On a down side, if you don’t win then you potentially lose too. Yes, you can always buy another ticket but is it worth the money that you are wasting. (*807)
There is always advantages to something that interests you, so I’ll talk about those now.