Ask YC: Have you, or anyone you know, won the lotto?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=137757

by moog • 18 years ago

4 6 18 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

How unlikely is it, really?

curi• 18 years ago

umm the odds are public knowledge?

moog• 18 years ago

Yes, the odds of winning are known for a sample set that is all lotto players in the population. This http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=137729 got me wondering if readers of HN would know more or less winners than one would expect.

Shooter• 18 years ago

Very unlikely, but I know three people that have won.

One of our neighbors won over $200 million in a tri-state lottery. They were very nice, sociable people before their win. Everyone liked them.

After?

Well, they built a HUGE 'modern' house (30K+ feet or so, and it looked like someone mixed a neon sign and a Lego set in a blender. It actually glowed in pastels at night.) They basically lost all taste. That didn't go over well with the neighborhood, but people still liked them and assumed it was just a weird splurge. Then the father of the winning family accidentally ran over the dog of one of our mutual friends with his new SUV. He had known the family with the dog for years and had attended barbecues with them almost every weekend in the summer. Their kids were on a soccer team together. The 'winner' refused to even talk to them about the accident - no apologies and no comforting words to the children of the family - because he was terrified they would try to sue him to get his money. He became a HUGE dick. He was eventually "shamed" out of our neighborhood, and he and his wife divorced. I think they're still fighting over their dwindling assets now, about a dozen years after their win. Their house was torn down and only their driveway gate remains.

The second winner I know is one of my uncles. I bought him a six-pack and a couple lotto tickets for Christmas as a joke once. He won around $2,500 with one of the tickets. I've never bought a lottery ticket for myself. I don't like the odds and I don't think I would do well with lots of money if I hadn't earned it myself. The third person I know that won doesn't really count (he became a client of my firm only because he had won and had assets to invest in our venture fund. I never would have known him had he not won.)

In other probability news, I know two people that were struck by lightning ;-) One of them was an alcoholic who worked for a beer distributor. He was wheeling a handcart of brew into a pub when he got zapped. It blew out his heels. He took it as a sign: no more drinking, new job. Now he's "born again" and annoying. I liked him more as an alcoholic ;-) The other guy was just a moron that must have missed the Ben Franklin story in school.

Flemlord• 18 years ago

A founder's elderly mother in the first startup I ever joined won the lotto, in the $100 million range. He he got swept up in the general excitement surrounding the win and lost focus. The other founders booted him, but I'm fuzzy on the details because I wasn't in "the loop" at the time.

ken• 18 years ago

My dad won $1 off a lotto ticket somebody gave him as a birthday present. I don't know anybody who's ever bought one.

So based on my experience, your chances are better if you don't buy a ticket. That's pretty darn unlikely.

ratsbane• 18 years ago

You're much more likely to be struck by lightning or bitten by a rattlesnake than you are to win a lottery (even assuming you buy a ticket.) Not being struck by lightning or bitten by a rattlesnake is one of my major goals and so I never buy lottery tickets.

Investing in the stock market or starting a business is risky enough - but with those activities you have much more control - and less potential for needing CPR.

To answer the original question, though, no - no one I know has ever won the lotto (or been bitten by a rattlesnake or struck by lightning.)

Ask YC: Have you, or anyone you know, won the lotto?

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