What lottery tickets win

The rule 5. Stop in time

And finally, I want to say, that even the probability 1/100 from the point of view of an individual, this is very little. If you check this probability once a month, then 100 таких проверок сделаете за 8 years. Imagine, во сколько раз ниже вероятность 1/1 000 000 or 1/100 000 000? Therefore, always bet only that amount, which you are not afraid to completely lose, and not a ruble more.

Finally, as promised, I will give an assessment of the statement from the beginning of the article. This data is for the USA, because the statement was formulated specifically for this country, besides, we have already calculated the odds for the American lottery above.

According to statistics, for 2016 год в США было совершено Crime in the US — 2016 near 17 000 убийств, we will consider this as an average figure. And also suppose, that the person is a potential target for murder, when he is already an adult, но не старый — то есть около 50 лет в течение своей жизни. Means, за эти 50 лет будет совершено около 850 000 убийств. Население США составляет United States Population 325,7 million people, то есть шансы попасть в случайную выборку размером 850 000 such:

But guess what, it's just a chance to be killed. Namely, on the way for a lottery ticket? Suppose, you go out to work every weekday, one weekend get out somewhere, and in the other you stay at home. В среднем получается 6 days a week, or about 26 дней в месяц. And once a month you buy a lottery ticket. Therefore, the numbers obtained must also be divided by 26:

And even with such a rough estimate, it is much more likely, than winning. More precisely, then in 30 000 раз вероятнее. Actually, of course, numbers will be different: a person is endangered not only on the street, some people take more risks, than others, women are killed almost four times less often, than men. But the principle is.

Хотя жить без веры в хорошие события и с постоянным ожиданием плохих, even knowing the math, Is not the best choice.

The rule 2. Play openly

Unfortunately, we cannot penetrate the inner kitchen of the lottery. But it is useful to understand at least the formal procedure for, how exactly is the drawing going.

for example, the famous one-armed bandit slot machines and other slot machines are actually a bit of a hoax: on the wheel, which the player sees, symbols of different values ​​are drawn, but at the same time everything is arranged like this, for the player to think, as if the chances of getting each symbol are the same. Actually (in old machines - mechanically, and in modern - using the program) the present is hidden behind every visible wheel, where valuable symbols are rare, and cheap ones often.

"Open" lotteries in this sense are much more honest. The format is widespread in the USA, when the ticket either contains a sequence of numbers, or it is chosen by the buyer independently. In Russia, eg, prefer lotto format: there are several lines of numbers on the ticket, and you need to close or one of them (ordinary victory), or all (jackpot). In theory, the lottery firm could "specially" print and sell non-winning tickets, and then juggle the order of the balls, but in practice large companies don't: lottery organizers always win, and the scandal in the event of an autopsy of bad faith will be huge.

If you intend to gamble, it will be useful to understand its mechanics and make sure that there is no stakeholder influence on the results.