Why people play the lottery
Tim Rivers, a recently laid-off factory worker, was the sole winner of an $89 million Powerball prize in Indiana. Tim and his wife Pam, both 24, plan to move out of their mobile home and buy a new house for themselves and their son, 6, and their daughter, 4, with the $49.9 million in cash they’ll receive for their prize.
Of course, the question is, why was a laid-off factory worker living in a mobile home with two young children spending his precious cash reserves on lottery tickets?
Unfortunately, no news service ever runs the headline, “Local man could have bought car with the money he wasted buying lottery tickets over the past 10 years.”
might be a tad late getting to this one, but as an old friend of tim’s, i felt the need to defend him. as i was told, he was down to his last $3 and had a bit of hope. i’d say it was well worth the risk. tim’s far from a bad father, so don’t try that card
Eric,
I’m still not going to defend buying lottery tickets as a useful financial strategy, but it sounds like Tim is a good fellow, and I’m happy that he and his family had a such a stroke of good fortune.
I just don’t believe that most people can count on such luck.