Lottery - colleague just won big
Discussion
onyx39 said:
What's your postal address please, I'm just off to write a begging letter..
I've often wondered, if I did win the lotto, what would I do about the begging letters? After all, they are so sad and desperate, and really tug on the heartstrings. Following much soul searching, I've decided I'll keep on sending them.I can't understand why anyone would go public after a lottery win. The benefits Camelot offers must be really convincing, because from the outside I see no benefit (and a whole load of downsides) to telling the entire world just how much money you've won, where you live, what you're planning to do with it, etc.
MissChief said:
Moonhawk said:
That article is wrong.
The stats that article is describing is more like a raffle.
If you hold 2 tickets and the raffle is drawn - the first time it is drawn you have a 1 in 14m chance of winning. If your ticket doesn't come up - the raffle is drawn again - but since the first ticket drawn has now been eliminated - you now have a 1 in 14m-1 chance to win. For each ticket you hold - the odds are reduced by 1 every time the raffle is drawn.
Since the lottery is only drawn once and you hold multiple tickets for that particular draw - the best analogy for it is the simple roll of a dice.
Look at it like this. You have a six sided dice and get to choose one number (say 4). You roll the dice. The odds of your number coming up are 1 in 6.
Now if you are allowed to choose two numbers from the dice (say 4 and 5) - the chances of one of your numbers coming up are now 2 in 6. You have doubled the chance that when the dice is thrown - one of the numbers you have chosen will come up.
The way that article describes this scenario - your odds would be 1 in 6 for the first number then 1 in 5 for the second. That is patently incorrect.
The lottery is essentially a 14m sided dice - with each side displaying a combination of 6 numbers. If you chose one set of 6 numbers - your chances are 1 in 14m. If you choose two sets of 6 numbers your chances of winning is 2 in 14m or 1 in 7m.
This scales up - so for example if you bought 7m lottery tickets - your chances of winning are 7m in 14m or 1 in 2 (50%).
The maths behind this is described in detail here:
http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.prob.world.ht...
So if you were to buy £7m worth of tickets, if you didn't win the jackpot but did win a lot of other prizes, what chance if breaking even?The stats that article is describing is more like a raffle.
If you hold 2 tickets and the raffle is drawn - the first time it is drawn you have a 1 in 14m chance of winning. If your ticket doesn't come up - the raffle is drawn again - but since the first ticket drawn has now been eliminated - you now have a 1 in 14m-1 chance to win. For each ticket you hold - the odds are reduced by 1 every time the raffle is drawn.
Since the lottery is only drawn once and you hold multiple tickets for that particular draw - the best analogy for it is the simple roll of a dice.
Look at it like this. You have a six sided dice and get to choose one number (say 4). You roll the dice. The odds of your number coming up are 1 in 6.
Now if you are allowed to choose two numbers from the dice (say 4 and 5) - the chances of one of your numbers coming up are now 2 in 6. You have doubled the chance that when the dice is thrown - one of the numbers you have chosen will come up.
The way that article describes this scenario - your odds would be 1 in 6 for the first number then 1 in 5 for the second. That is patently incorrect.
The lottery is essentially a 14m sided dice - with each side displaying a combination of 6 numbers. If you chose one set of 6 numbers - your chances are 1 in 14m. If you choose two sets of 6 numbers your chances of winning is 2 in 14m or 1 in 7m.
This scales up - so for example if you bought 7m lottery tickets - your chances of winning are 7m in 14m or 1 in 2 (50%).
The maths behind this is described in detail here:
http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.prob.world.ht...
Edited by Moonhawk on Thursday 25th December 10:24
Edited by Moonhawk on Thursday 25th December 10:25
MissChief said:
Moonhawk said:
That article is wrong.
The stats that article is describing is more like a raffle.
If you hold 2 tickets and the raffle is drawn - the first time it is drawn you have a 1 in 14m chance of winning. If your ticket doesn't come up - the raffle is drawn again - but since the first ticket drawn has now been eliminated - you now have a 1 in 14m-1 chance to win. For each ticket you hold - the odds are reduced by 1 every time the raffle is drawn.
Since the lottery is only drawn once and you hold multiple tickets for that particular draw - the best analogy for it is the simple roll of a dice.
Look at it like this. You have a six sided dice and get to choose one number (say 4). You roll the dice. The odds of your number coming up are 1 in 6.
Now if you are allowed to choose two numbers from the dice (say 4 and 5) - the chances of one of your numbers coming up are now 2 in 6. You have doubled the chance that when the dice is thrown - one of the numbers you have chosen will come up.
The way that article describes this scenario - your odds would be 1 in 6 for the first number then 1 in 5 for the second. That is patently incorrect.
The lottery is essentially a 14m sided dice - with each side displaying a combination of 6 numbers. If you chose one set of 6 numbers - your chances are 1 in 14m. If you choose two sets of 6 numbers your chances of winning is 2 in 14m or 1 in 7m.
This scales up - so for example if you bought 7m lottery tickets - your chances of winning are 7m in 14m or 1 in 2 (50%).
The maths behind this is described in detail here:
http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.prob.world.ht...
So if you were to buy £7m worth of tickets, if you didn't win the jackpot but did win a lot of other prizes, what chance if breaking even?The stats that article is describing is more like a raffle.
If you hold 2 tickets and the raffle is drawn - the first time it is drawn you have a 1 in 14m chance of winning. If your ticket doesn't come up - the raffle is drawn again - but since the first ticket drawn has now been eliminated - you now have a 1 in 14m-1 chance to win. For each ticket you hold - the odds are reduced by 1 every time the raffle is drawn.
Since the lottery is only drawn once and you hold multiple tickets for that particular draw - the best analogy for it is the simple roll of a dice.
Look at it like this. You have a six sided dice and get to choose one number (say 4). You roll the dice. The odds of your number coming up are 1 in 6.
Now if you are allowed to choose two numbers from the dice (say 4 and 5) - the chances of one of your numbers coming up are now 2 in 6. You have doubled the chance that when the dice is thrown - one of the numbers you have chosen will come up.
The way that article describes this scenario - your odds would be 1 in 6 for the first number then 1 in 5 for the second. That is patently incorrect.
The lottery is essentially a 14m sided dice - with each side displaying a combination of 6 numbers. If you chose one set of 6 numbers - your chances are 1 in 14m. If you choose two sets of 6 numbers your chances of winning is 2 in 14m or 1 in 7m.
This scales up - so for example if you bought 7m lottery tickets - your chances of winning are 7m in 14m or 1 in 2 (50%).
The maths behind this is described in detail here:
http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.prob.world.ht...
Edited by Moonhawk on Thursday 25th December 10:24
Edited by Moonhawk on Thursday 25th December 10:25
Those same proportions apply to the other entrants' ticket money. The idea of massive ticket buying is a good one in some circumstances (but it's not allowed), but it relies on you winning the jackpot.
Silent1 said:
Moonhawk said:
TwigtheWonderkid said:
Buy 4 in 1 week and whilst the first ticket is covering 14m possibilities, the 2nd is only covering 13,999,999 possibilities because you've already covered 1, the 3rd 13,999,998 because 2 are already covered and the 4th 13,999,997 as 3 are already covered.
Your overall chances of winning if you buy 4 tickets for the same draw are 14m/4 or ~1 in 3,500,000.http://www.british-gazette.co.uk/what-are-the-chan...
7m tickets takes your odds to 7,000,000/14,000,000 which can be presented as 1/2. 50%.
Where people struggle is with the fractional presentation of odds. They have watched the number on the right of the fraction falling quickly as their notional investment increases and so they think the next ticket should then get them to 1/1.
It doesn't.
It takes you to 7,000,001 / 14,000,000. A smidge better than 1/2.
Once you're at 1/2 (50%) it'll cost you another £7m to get to 1/1 (100%).
Moonhawk said:
The way that article describes this scenario - your odds would be 1 in 6 for the first number then 1 in 5 for the second. That is patently incorrect.
That alone is correct. If you don't win with the first number, you have a 1 in 5 chance of winning with the second.However the total chance of winning is thus (1/6) + (5/6 * 1/5) which is 2/6 or 1/3. The article totally cocks that up.
trashbat said:
hat alone is correct. If you don't win with the first number, you have a 1 in 5 chance of winning with the second.
However the total chance of winning is thus (1/6) + (5/6 * 1/5) which is 2/6 or 1/3. The article totally cocks that up.
Perhaps - but it doesn't make much sense to evaluate each number separately. In reality whether the result is 4 or 5 you win and that is all you care about.However the total chance of winning is thus (1/6) + (5/6 * 1/5) which is 2/6 or 1/3. The article totally cocks that up.
hora said:
"People will find out anyway" and..
Show the world, all those who doubted you etc that you've made it".
I bet there are loads of those.
My mouth would be nailed shut for thousands of different reasons.
Me too, I think people you know would obviously find out something, but I'd always tell them I only won a few million at most, if it was something like a 8 or 9 figure win, but I wouldn't put myself out there for all the press to see, and try dig up dirt on me, or wShow the world, all those who doubted you etc that you've made it".
I bet there are loads of those.
My mouth would be nailed shut for thousands of different reasons.
k themselves into a coma because I've gone out and bought a nice house or a car. There are still 4 out of the top 10 UK winners who have remained anonymous IIRC. Wasn't there the guy who ran a music shop, and wanted to continue doing that, but had to give in because people would come in to gawp and his shop would get begging letters. You'd have to be mad to go public.
aww999 said:
I read a story (no idea if true) back when the UK lottery first started, about a US guy who realised that one of the state lotteries regularly rolled over enough to be worth multiple times the cost of buying every ticket combination.
...
Frustratingly, I can't remember where I read it, and have never managed to find it again ( Ihave tried googling "guaranteed lottery winning plan" but there are quite a few hits for that!), so it may be entirely made up! Does it ring a bell with anyone else?
http://www.nytimes.com/1992/02/25/us/group-invests......
Frustratingly, I can't remember where I read it, and have never managed to find it again ( Ihave tried googling "guaranteed lottery winning plan" but there are quite a few hits for that!), so it may be entirely made up! Does it ring a bell with anyone else?
J4CKO said:
Money doesn't immediately make you happy, it is what you do with it and partially just the security it brings, after all there is only so much "stuff" you can buy.
From what I have seen of friends and acquaintances, people with more money than "middle-income households" (who can already afford a house, 2 cars, motorbike, hobbies, foreign holidays and all of the gadgets they would ever need) typically just buy more expensive versions of the same things. The actual difference in "quality of life" is arguable, especially as they are (generally) working much longer hours and travelling away from friends and family far more. What is interesting is that many of the People I've come across who've bought flash/exotic/fast cars because they had come into money didn't really enjoy them, because they weren't actually into cars....The one thing that I, would like is more free time for hobbies and, okay, and an air-cooled Porsche or two -although tinkering with them would be a hobby.
J4CKO said:
I know people who have massive houses, they squirrel themselves away with basically their own leisure center and posh hotel, all behind electric gates.......I look at said massive houses and after a point, yeah, all very nice but though the house gets much much bigger, we are the same size, we dont scale, I see massive sitting rooms with a corner occupied by a sofa and TV, the rest a massive void, there are only so many rooms you need, I reckon we could do with perhaps an extra 5 on our 4 bed detached and a decent garage, after that, its showing off really, I suspect, if you had 100 rooms, you would live in a subset of rooms like the owners of stately homes do. There is a mansion for sale locally that has a cinema, nightclub and god knows what else, yeah, every house needs a nightclub....
I reckon 2 or 3 million would do me, in fact less, I am reasonably well off, mortgage paid, no debts but sometimes could do with a bit more spends, a few hundred grand maybe, give the kids a bit more of a start, few nice holidays, pay to get some stuff done like cleaning and decorating, be able to change the cars when I fancy and enough to fall back on. I would fly Business/first class, would buy better clothes but not go overboard.
I also know people of means and I too see the enormous houses of Cheshire almost every day and I genuinely feel no envy or desire for something similar, despite living in a fairly normal, red-brick, middle-England suburb.I reckon 2 or 3 million would do me, in fact less, I am reasonably well off, mortgage paid, no debts but sometimes could do with a bit more spends, a few hundred grand maybe, give the kids a bit more of a start, few nice holidays, pay to get some stuff done like cleaning and decorating, be able to change the cars when I fancy and enough to fall back on. I would fly Business/first class, would buy better clothes but not go overboard.
I could cope with a bigger garage, (and a collection of tatty, but well-used cars and bikes), but I feel no need to live in my own DeVere-hotel-esque footballer's house.
I once read (possibly by Hunter Davies) about John Lennon living in an enormous old house, but choosing to lie on a sofa in a small room watching TV rather than in a grand hall.
I too am of the "couple of million quid is enough" point of view. Enough to buy me some freedom and choice in pursuing my interests, but not enough to put me onto The Times Rich List.
Edited by MC Bodge on Friday 26th December 00:01
I would like extra time to myself, but, to be honest I think working 40 plus hours a week makes our spare time more special, if it was all spare time I think I would get bored and would have to find something to fill the gap, I think it is similar to the money thing, unlimited money might be boring as well, half the fun with thins you buy is doing the research, the anticipation and it turning up.
So, perhaps, for me, a bit more spare time and a bit more money would be good, not sure I would want seven days a week free and the ability to buy anything, after all, most of your friends would still have to work, I dont think I could do my current job though if I had several million in the bank, I have to go into work now because I have bills to pay, doing it when I dont need to wouldn't happen and I think that may cause a problem, so, basically I am happy with my lot, so current lot with a day a week extra spare and a million quid, perfection I reckon.
So, perhaps, for me, a bit more spare time and a bit more money would be good, not sure I would want seven days a week free and the ability to buy anything, after all, most of your friends would still have to work, I dont think I could do my current job though if I had several million in the bank, I have to go into work now because I have bills to pay, doing it when I dont need to wouldn't happen and I think that may cause a problem, so, basically I am happy with my lot, so current lot with a day a week extra spare and a million quid, perfection I reckon.
J4CKO said:
I would like extra time to myself, but, to be honest I think working 40 plus hours a week makes our spare time more special, if it was all spare time I think I would get bored and would have to find something to fill the gap, I think it is similar to the money thing, unlimited money might be boring as well, half the fun with thins you buy is doing the research, the anticipation and it turning up.
So, perhaps, for me, a bit more spare time and a bit more money would be good, not sure I would want seven days a week free and the ability to buy anything, after all, most of your friends would still have to work, I dont think I could do my current job though if I had several million in the bank, I have to go into work now because I have bills to pay, doing it when I dont need to wouldn't happen and I think that may cause a problem, so, basically I am happy with my lot, so current lot with a day a week extra spare and a million quid, perfection I reckon.
some very fortunate people enjoy work so much they would do it for nothing -Most don't. So, perhaps, for me, a bit more spare time and a bit more money would be good, not sure I would want seven days a week free and the ability to buy anything, after all, most of your friends would still have to work, I dont think I could do my current job though if I had several million in the bank, I have to go into work now because I have bills to pay, doing it when I dont need to wouldn't happen and I think that may cause a problem, so, basically I am happy with my lot, so current lot with a day a week extra spare and a million quid, perfection I reckon.
Ideally, I would be occupied by something enjoyable and useful.
Having some more spare time would suit me fine as working a full week and having 2 young children don't leave a lot for my preferred, time-consuming, hobbies.
"Projects" and learning that involve time, work and thinking, rather than just cash would provide me with some stimulation.
Edited by MC Bodge on Friday 26th December 16:25
J4CKO said:
I would like extra time to myself, but, to be honest I think working 40 plus hours a week makes our spare time more special, if it was all spare time I think I would get bored and would have to find something to fill the gap, I think it is similar to the money thing, unlimited money might be boring as well, half the fun with thins you buy is doing the research, the anticipation and it turning up.
So, perhaps, for me, a bit more spare time and a bit more money would be good, not sure I would want seven days a week free and the ability to buy anything, after all, most of your friends would still have to work, I dont think I could do my current job though if I had several million in the bank, I have to go into work now because I have bills to pay, doing it when I dont need to wouldn't happen and I think that may cause a problem, so, basically I am happy with my lot, so current lot with a day a week extra spare and a million quid, perfection I reckon.
My issue with this and a lot of people. What will you do when you retire? Properly retire, no 4 days weeks, no 3 day weekends. You stop work have an income from your pension. What are you going to do with yourself? So, perhaps, for me, a bit more spare time and a bit more money would be good, not sure I would want seven days a week free and the ability to buy anything, after all, most of your friends would still have to work, I dont think I could do my current job though if I had several million in the bank, I have to go into work now because I have bills to pay, doing it when I dont need to wouldn't happen and I think that may cause a problem, so, basically I am happy with my lot, so current lot with a day a week extra spare and a million quid, perfection I reckon.
Cotty said:
My issue with this and a lot of people. What will you do when you retire? Properly retire, no 4 days weeks, no 3 day weekends. You stop work have an income from your pension. What are you going to do with yourself?
A lot of people do struggle because only their work gives them something to do. My parents and my in-laws are active, interested people in their 60s and loving retirement.
Slightly different, but I remember my Dad telling me years ago about blokes he knew who had worked every possible hour and chased the rate to save up "for retirement" only to end up dead very shortly into retirement.
Edited by MC Bodge on Friday 26th December 16:26
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