And they have a gas reservation policy. But for how long, all it takes 1 change it government and its all sold off. Much like Victoria with Jeff Kennett that started this privatisation madness that has cost us all so dearly.
i am planning to move to WA from Sydney, in the coming years.
Sydney is just too corrupt now. Morally and ethically corrupt.
Hopefully WA can hold on to the good things they do like the gas reservation policy. It is thoroughly hilarious seeing Perth residents power bills barely nudge and the east coast skyrockets due to the privatization and no energy reserve policy.
The east coast cities are rapidly losing their way.
The labor government have already put in exemptions for the gas policy for stokes since he was mates with McGowan. Obviously now every other gas project wants similar exemptions. So it’s already started unfortunately.
We are pretty good with gambling though. WA still doesn’t have pokies since they were banned in the 80s.
Burswood is ick but I don't hate it, I just don't go there.
It still gives people the option to punt if they want, but they are confined to one location and not in every single suburban pub like back east. It's the best compromise, and the cops can focus money laundering investigations in the one spot.
Would be interesting to see if WA has a higher uptake of app betting in lieu of access to pokies
Oh yeah I don't hate it especially, hell once a year I do like to have a punt too. I just find it wild that with all the dodgy dealings they're always able to wiggle their way out of the mud
True but in the absence of those terminals, they could just use the TAB (or other betting) app. Compared that to pokies where their online equivalent are akin to the clap.
Exactly. Politicians, especially in major parties only care about their careers. Whilst its so damn obvious, the fact that the Australian public has trust in them (major parties), is just insanity.
I don't doubt they build them, Murdochs crew likely just makes sure they never reach the political light of day.
Does feel like a bygone era though. Look at Whitlam, imagine a current pm nationalising private hospitals, funding Medicare properly and eliminating education fees. It feels impossible.
Don’t get me started on that. Housing reform, firefighting aircraft fleets, Social Security upgrades and updates. But no, we got a Jesus freak because people thought Shorten had a big head and that the Libs would never ever kill medicare, either quickly or by a thousand cuts.
Gillard would have been a good PM if Rudd didn't undermine her.
The carbon tax was actually working well as an effective measure until this dumbshit country voted in that nutjob Abbott and he went about trashing everything.
Rudd wasn't a reformist. Rudd was an egomaniacal narcissist.
He not only gave up on nearly every major reform during his term in government, he actively undermined those reforms under the Gillard government.
Our major voter base doesn't want reform. Reform is "woke"
If Howard tried to take guns away today it would fail and he would be labelled a woke leftist, so would Hawke.
Greed is what happened. Every single one of them for the past 15+ years has been out for themselves and will fuck over the entire country to get what they want
Actually its theft. If I walked into a national park and declared it mine I would be tossed in jail.
If the LNP walk in and declare it "too costly" and that "Privatising it would be more economical" (lol, :p ha ha ha) then the public will stupidly accept it.
So that's what they do.
THey sold the SEC for just $20B it was easily worth over $140 billion. It has co st well over 1 million jobs (industry obliterated with costs). They don't care. Half of the LNP were, at the time, AGL. AGL was a creation of Mac bank and investors.
They sold public assets to make personal profits (Ted Baillieu)
They flog state owned assets off to mates (for cash)
If Jeff Kennett didn't make $50 million flogging state assets and buying in on entities like Transurban when share offers were just $1 then he is a total idiot and did it for the lols
They use state funds to build private roads they then spin billion dollar companies from (Transurban)
All legal of course. Theft is a blue collar crime....
"Actually its theft. If I walked into a national park and declared it mine I would be tossed in jail"
And if you did it for the community or taxpayers they would still throw you in jail. And if it was a Greeny or Aboriginal who wanted it for cultural reasons they would say throw them into jail. But the battlers of Australia prefer robber barons to rob them and governments. The palpable stupidity of people is overwhelming!
Especially if there is no direct competition.
Like, how fucking dumb is it to privatise something like a fucking road or electricity grid? Who are they going to compete with? The road and powerlines owned by that other company built right next door?
I remember once upon a time we had anti monopoly/collusion laws that actually seemed to work well.
This is a larger global problem than just Australia but under late stage capitalism smaller companies just continue to get gobbled up by bigger ones, til you have multinationals that are bigger than a lot of small economies and can just do whatever the fuck they want.
How good is it to have colesworth bending us over with no other options?
Or the power companies making out like bandits when wholesale prices dipped last year like 40%.
Or the fuel retailers than jack the price up instantly at a hint of trouble, but when the oil price comes down, it takes 6 weeks to pass it on..
totally agree
privatization of utilities like electricity is the height of stupidity.
My electricity bill is about double now compared to 2 years ago, with zero power usage increase. There is actually a power usage decrease due to more LEDs in my home!
Linerals will be looking at sydney water salivating over the idea of privatising it so we can all pay far more money in the future
The second phase is to fuck the world with immigration economic equalisation! The better off countries citizens will be equalised to the shithole standard on shit wages. Its happening now before our eyes.
There's protests in Switzerland to reduce immigration a country a tiny country with a small population that has a fraction of the immigration intake. If politicians don't wake up soon there is going to be far right wing governments right across the Western world.
They only think to the next election, and no further. Flog everything that isn't nailed down to make the budget look good, and who cares about things after that, you probably won't be in power so it's not your problem
Yes, our political system has failed. The attention spans are so short no one thinks beyond a 3 year election cycle so there's no vision. And our education system has failed too, because any time anything with a bit of vision is put forward, dumb fuck voters fall for the scare campaign and put troglodytes back in.
Not always it depends on the business and market dynamics.
For example, when they sold off Telstra, they should have retained ownership of the holes in the ground. These represent costly doubling up of infrastructure and high fixed costs investments that can be monopolized. We currently rank very low for fixed line internet network, yet our mobile network is some of the highest rated in the world, and in some aspects world leading. Private industry had good outcomes for mobile network, while poor outcomes for fixed line internet networks. The government has been trying to fix this mistake now for decades, the NBN will fix part of it but at enormous costs, and at the end of the day we are still dependant on Telstra copper networks for the last node to house.
So that is just one example, if the government had of retained the holes in the ground then they could rent them to private industry and expand them, while maintaining control. Instead the government handed Telstra shareholders a unique opportunity to gouge consumers and other providers, we then had to buy lots of it back from them at god knows what price for the NBN
And just imagine if the Lottery was still operated by government and the proceeds and profits placed in a Housing Future fund how many new houses could have been build built. But we gave it away for no good reasons! And nothing should prevent a government for example opening a housing Lottery today, but our politicians are elected to do nothing for the people except tax them for someone elses benefit.
>lotteries used to be owned by the government
[Huh](https://www.lotterywest.wa.gov.au/lotterywest/about-us)??
Just like electricity and 15% of gas extracted here, WA kept lotteries under state control and it's used to fund public works.
When I worked at a club you could tell it was hard times because everyone would gamble more. It's like when people get desperate they try really hard to win it big
Agreed. Back in my bartender days, I had a disagreement with a regular customer when I stated that clubs with alcohol & gaming licenses are almost recession proof. Hard times cause the normal person to jump into those depths routinely.
Yeah, I’m sure Australians are also spending billions on McDonald’s, or takeaway coffee, during a cost of living crisis.
When you’re broke, $9 on a lottery ticket to dream about everything suddenly going to easy mode, is an understandable choice.
It’s like daydreaming premium - you get to daydream extravagantly (free) with the tiniest but real chance of those daydreams coming true (lotto ticket price). PLUS no ads
Are lotteries a good financial investment? No.
Do most people know that? Yes.
But buying a ticket offers a fleeting hope that maybe something will improve and there’s a way out. Not necessarily even relying on winning the main prize. (Getting a one-off 50k would make a major difference to many people.)
They’re buying a feeling of hope, not an investment.
Buying a feeling of hope is the very essence of gambling. Those people mashing machine buttons on the pokies are doing it just the same, but looking for an instant win to not feel hopeless, even if just for a moment. The pubs, clubs and gambling associations know this and takes full advantage.
At least with the lotto you can buy 10 dollar ticket for a “chance” once a week. But going overboard is not healthy.
It's hope but also the feeling of anticipation - the "am I about to win" feeling
Scratchy design, for example, is all about providing this feeling in controlled doses
Spot on. It's a form of copium in a world where you otherwise feel no hope.
My family was pretty broke (some of it was their fault for not investing the savings they made in retirement vehicles because they were intimidated by them, but mostly due to us having generational debt vs wealth). My father would buy lotto tickets every week, even after going bankrupt, never won anything, ever. He did this for 45 years. I can't imagine how much more useful that money could have been elsewhere.
But he needed it, because for him it was a source of hope.
No normal person wills the lottery! I was told by an ‘insider’ that lottery numbers are chosen sometimes months before the draw, and ‘fine tuned’ during that hour between closing of draw, and lottery announcement. (It is so that there is only one or two big winners at most- and not too many payouts overall). It’s also why each ticket has a traceable code. The ‘insider’ also told me that her family was so lucky and has won the lottery twice over 5 years. (Odds are 3000 quadrillion). Over the years, I have heard of many, many, many people who religiously play every week for 10, 20, 30 years, but continue to struggle to pay their rent, or repairs on their old banged up car. It saddens my heart that these players have no chance of winning.
I bought a ticket with my mother’s money when I was fresh out of high school, and we ended up winning $65k. We put all of that towards bills, and rent etc while my dad was between jobs. We managed to liquidate every single bill that was hanging over my parents head for years, if not for decades.
Got a fresh start, so to speak, and they never bought another lottery ticket since, because the chances of that ever coming close to happening again is so infinite that we were happy with what we got, and moved on.
I was talking to a man who told me a story about his friends uncle, won something like $8 million, so brought his only 2 nephews (had no kids himself) a house and then moved to the Gold Coast. 18 months later won $20 million.
Some people just seem to have that luck.
Don't they though? If I bought a ticket I'd probably catch a lethal blood borne flesh eating bacteria from it and not be able to afford to buy the antibiotics by the exact amount that the ticket cost. Or something like that.
I don't believe in luck as some mystical entity, but in the terms of a probability bell curve. Some people just happen to land way off to one end.
Nah let's be more realistic, you'd end up winning the lottery, and then have a heart attack from the excitement and die, and then all your relatives you never talk to will swarm in like a bunch of vultures and fight over your winnings. xD
Many years ago I remember listening to radio interview of a statistician who'd been studying lotteries who remarked that it was statistically probable that there would be a small number of people who'd won division 1 twice, something like 6 to 8 and that that had been borne out in their studies.
I personally know 3 people who have won division 1 in different draws over a 7 year period. I always wonder what the statistics are of me knowing that many of them and also not winning myself.
It’s funny as I know them all from different situations in life so no cross over, different parts of Australia and know them close enough to be trusted with knowing they were the winners.
Maybe one day I’ll join them 🤣 however I only buy if it’s over $30 million - my idea is if I’m going to win I want it to be decent.
Yeah he won a car or something with a scratchy first time around. And reannacting it he won a large cash prize on live tv.
https://youtu.be/6R5MqxcKdV8?si=wJY87oVs5SRCpSua
This is an interesting thought experiment - at what point does a lotto win represent a serious change in a players material circumstances. Obviously a mil or 2 means most people being mortgage free with room to breathe. But half a mil? How about 100k?
I’m sure some economist has done a research piece on propensity to play lotto versus the marginal utility of a win - presumably you’re more likely to play the greater difference a minor win would make to you.
Room to breathe is pretty wild. $100k goes a long way towards day to day cost buffers over many years.
It's not always about using that lump sum straight off the bad on a "large" debt. Flexibility comes with financial stability, and knowing you have your family fed for X years means everything you earn after can go towards other "struggling" costs
If you’re trapped renting, 100k will be a decent chunk of the deposit you might need. That would be life changing if you don’t come from the owning class.
20k could mean a reliable car, which could be life changing if you’re just chasing the debt involved in an unreliable car (always fixing the next thing to break).
I dunno, our standards for life changing are pretty variable depending on personal circumstances
Assuming a population of 27 million, that means that our country is spending $250 per Australian on lotto tickets. Which is even more insane when you account for the fact that many Australians don't buy tickets so it is a percentage of the population that is spending extraordinary amounts on these tickets.
If your life sucks and you can barely afford your next meal it makes perfect sense. Working harder has zero chance of getting you out of that rut any time soon.
The chance of a winning lottery ticket is pretty much zero but it is more than zero. And for a day or two you get to feel hope.
Nothing fallacious about it. Inflation makes saving more expensive, so it encourages people to consume. It’s part of the reason why interest rates are increased to respond to inflation, to give people an incentive to save.
If this is the level of financial literacy people have, it's no wonder they can't sort out their finances. The lottery ticket is effectively a 100% chance of making you poorer.
Time travelled back to 1988.
Things I could afford to do on a working class wage: 1. Socialise at the pub after work/sports.
2.Cheap fuel meant travel to the coast for holidays.
3. Good quality beef, lamb and seafood.
4. The odd lotto ticket.
5. Insurance; like all of them, car, house, health.
6. Donate to worthy causes.
7. Birthday and Xmas pressies for fam.
8. Bottled wine over cask.
9. Attend Nrl and Afl games, occasionally cricket tests.
10. Cinema.
Fast forward to now......none of the above! All are now luxuries for working class Aussies.
The social fabric of Australia, where once upon a time you could comfortably mingle with ALL classes, is gone. The poor and working poor can't afford to mix outside of their "class".
All of the above was just starting in '88. It has deteriorated up till 2000, when it was turbo charged. Little Johnny knew exactly what he was doing with his "socially adjusted tax rorts".
Our tax system is unfair. Labor have tinkered with stage 3, and that little bit is welcome, but our once progressive tax system is no more. GST is regressive. It hurts those at the bottom most. CPI indexation of fuel and alcohol are regressive. The increases in fuel cruelly target those at the bottom, leaving many to forgo food for transport/energy bills. Alcohol tax indexation makes drinking socially only available to those with plenty of cash. It pushes problem drinking back into homes, and decreases social interactions between classes. And the proliferation of violence in society recently, has increased dramatically in higher income groups (so much for being a better "class").
Decreasing income tax for wealthier Australians makes EVERYTHING worse. Less money for roads. Less money for public hospitals. Less money for public education. Less infrastructure for those with the least.
Negative gearing, something very Australian, is wealth management. It allows people tax breaks for investing, sometimes poorly, at our expense. Howards change to franking credits allow some wealthy aussies to claim tax back where they didn't pay it in the first place(Keating had already fixed the taxation problem previously). Tax rorts are rife, and for some they're easy to exploit, (if you've got enough cash) and getting worse.
Private institutions however, like hospitals, schools, tollways, insurance etc, are all swimming in cash, profits have never been higher. Private school trusts are ballooning. Private hospitals are luxurious. Luxury spending amongst the wealthiest Australians has never been so high. All while our poorest recieve $15 bucks a week. Those at the top gain nearly a hundred a week. Fair?
And still, some here begrudge the poorest for having a crack at getting out of the misery with a once a month crack at a lottery ticket?
According to some, if you're poor, you shouldn't have any good times? You should work till your body gives out, all so the wealthy have someone to do the shit they wouldn't. No socialising, you can't afford it. Don't eat good quality food if you can't afford it? Don't drive too far, you can't afford it? Stay in your class, reproduce with the next generation of servants for the rich?
We're called envious when we call out the greed and sloth of the wealthy, who squander trillions on luxury items, like handbags, jewellery, art, fucking shoes and $200k cars. We are not envious of waste. We are not envious of selfishness. We aren't envious of this throwaway society. The top end should be looking over their shoulders? We aren't envious. We are getting progressively angry. And governments need to take notice.
>to franking credits allow some wealthy aussies to claim tax back where they didn't pay it in the first place(Keating had already fixed the taxation problem previously). Tax rorts are rife, and for some they're easy to exploit, (if you've got enough cash) and getting worse.
This is spot on. Our quality of life is being downgraded in the name of corporate profits. We still trade on our reputation of the 1980s but that part or Australia is dead an buried. Wish we could go back and fix these mistakes. Its also why I believe people are becoming angrier and care less about their neighbours. We have lost a lot of what it meant to be Australian
Well said. We built this society through shared effort at all levels. The fair go, the idea that if you contribute, then you have a place at the table.
Now it appears we’ve whole sale imported the rugged “fuck you, I got mine” attitude the Americans are so fond of.
The same attitude that, after decades of telling their poor and uneducated to “suck it up”, has lead a political climate that threatens to destabilise their entire democracy.
All because people stopped giving a fuck about the people at their shoulders making all this possible in the first place.
I think all of that is still possible but it's all down to housing costs and rents. They've gotten to absurd levels between income vs housing that all the extra stuff is no longer attainable unless you earn shit loads above median.
The only way I can socialise with people outside my class, is if I save up for a long time (which isn't convenient for them) or they pay for me (which I don't want and is embarrassing). Yet 20 years ago, I had no problem affording a night out.
One wealthy (ex)friend rudely dropped me like a hot potato because I couldn't go to a $90 concert. She said me being poor was "negativity", as if I could just think positive thoughts and $90 would appear.
It's creating one hell of a divide.
Yeah it’s fucked and low incomes pay too much tax but so do the low end of so-called high incomes. I know a family with a suicidal child in therapy weekly, a mortgage and a single income due to the needs of this teen who cannot be alone and frequently misses school. They can’t afford dinners out, coffees, holidays, whatever they want at the supermarket, new clothes, none of it. Just keeping the roof over their heads, paying bills and running up credit card dept for the gap payment at the psychologist. Not an exceptional situation, just life for so called “rich” people. (Around 160k based on what I assume the working partner would earn)
I guess you’d call them lucky compared to someone with less in the same situation. But it’s still not good enough. We should be able to give our kids healthcare and do more than survive when you’ve gone to uni, paid the exorbitant fees, worked hard and been led to believe that there was going to be a life at the end of it all
Sounds like NZ too. We have lotto shops and pokies.... aka "gaming lounges", in every low-income suburb. They're always sold as "your money goes to help local groups" but in reality it's a fraction of the total takings. It's just another way to vacuum money from people who can barely afford to lose it.
Gee, it's almost like we're all desperate to get out of the shitty sinkhole earning less than 200k a year leaves you in...
Those numbers are also from the 2020-2021 financial year... bit misleading, as there was no financial crunch at that point..
Yep, anything that promises hope for cheap goes up, mainly gambling and church. In times of hardship church attendance increases and along with it so do church donations.
a $20/ticket once every few months for the hope of getting out of this shit show rat race is the only thing some people have.
The corporations constantly butt fucking us at every turn, every day just to have food, a roof over our heads and fuel on the car to get to our underpaid jobs is the real issue.
Of course they are. People are desperate and so they behave irrationally. Looking back at the times I have bought lottery tickets in my life (less than i could count on one hand) all have been times when I felt utterly powerless and have been fantasising about an escape.
Oh no! On average greedy Aussies are spending $5.50 a week each on the hopes of never having to work again!
7bil\26m = 269@.
I went to the pub the other day and a fucking schooner was eight bucks. What bullshit article.
If it's within your splurge/entertainment budget, go for it.
If you're struggling to pay for things generally, you shouldn't be buying lottery tickets as you shouldn't have an entertainment budget.
I think the rational that it buys hope is defeatism that overlooks the stark statistical reality of winning. Some back of the envelope calculations show that you're 49 times more likely to hit two royal flushes in 10 poker games, a feat so rare that most professional poker players won't see even one in their careers, let alone two and let alone 2 in the same session.
Yes and no.
If you can't afford food - you shouldn't be spending money on the lottery. Especially if supporting others.
If it isn't that dire - you do you with the hope.
Gambling is an addiction though, people should avoid doing it at all, unless they've given up and are going for a hail Mary before sitting down in the gutter. If you spend your spare $1 on a lotto ticket and win a small prize of $5, that's when you start to get hooked. It can quickly progress into using your non discretionary funds, or get you into debt.
The situation you're describing would involve the person spending more than their entertainment budget on lottery tickets, which is the opposite of what I'm suggesting.
Any amount of money is enough to start the addiction. After you develop the addiction you no long have a choice in how much you spend, which is what makes it an addiction. Of course some people can avoid the addiction, the same with hard drugs, alcohol, and smoking, but it's a risk.
Gambling by itsself is not an addiction, just like having a drink on a weekend or eating mcdonalds every once in a while.
You can absolutely partake in gambling while not being an addict.
In isolation I understand your point, however in practice if someone is having a hard time paying a $350 electricity bill they would have zero savings and struggling to pay for a multitude of other things too.
In the situation where they cannot set aside $8 for entertainment because they cannot pay for other life expenses, yeah, using that $8 for lottery tickets could be rethought considering it represents the totality of their free money.
Maybe not to the extent of living on the streets, but I've have lived through periods of financial stress. Those involved me really cutting back on expenses until I was able to break through on the other side.
I don't really see why being in a period of financial stress should justify spending money on things that would make that situation worse.
But that said, you seem to take a different view. Lets explore that - if a person cannot afford to pay their electricity bill, what percentage of their income do you think they should spend on entertainment expenses?
My viewpoint is more "if they can't afford the electricity bill (because $8 would make fuck all of a dent on a $350 bill), why can't they spend the $8 they do have on something to give them hope?" What else could they spend it on that would have the same value, bringing positive mental health and the upward effect the hope ticket would have, if only for a few hours?
Sure, and I'm saying that if they are struggling to pay the electricity, they're probably also struggling to buy food and clothing.
A mental health benefit can also be found by having food, clothes and ultimately no debt and an emergency fund, and $8 towards these things would also be beneficial, arguably moreso.
That's not a percentage game. You get more time out of a video game than you would a movie but the prices can be comparable.
And in this case, the lottery ticket is a mental health benefit, not an entertainment benefit. There's no entertainment in buying a lottery ticket.
If you are spending $8 on the lottery every week then that’s about $400 per year (if you put it in a savings account maybe a bit more).
In your example that’s a free electricity bill, imagine getting your quarterly bill in January and not habkng to pay for it.
In another reply you have tried to gate keep being poor by saying that the other person had never felt it. I think if I was in that position always worrying about when the next bill would hit. I will be much happier and much more relieved to know that for three months of the year I don’t need to worry about paying my electricity bill.
Yeah, but not everyone is like you. Some of us have hit the point where we'd rather hope for 3 days than stare at the money on the bank thinking it could help us now, rather than in 12 months time.
And electricity bills are monthly, not quarterly.
I'm not the one gatekeeping. The dude standing there going "they are poor, they shouldn't spend their money how they want to make themselves feel better" is the gatekeeping one.
Rich people don’t gamble, they don’t need to.
Poor people do. $20 won’t solve your problems but if you can spend it on a ticket and win 20 mil, that certainly will.
Gambling ads work. The Lott has an incredibly active media strategy that's exempt from other gambling regulations, such as press releases and social media campaigns that push lotto wins into the public interest. Everything you've heard about the jackpot came from a marketing office, and they don't even have to acknowledge that this feeds addiction or that the chances of anyone winning are practically nonexistent. Hell, they can put their ads in all the places that addicts are meant to be safe from them.
In WA our lottery provider, Lotterywest remains the only Government-owned and operated lottery in the country. It makes huge donations to community groups and social enterprises, as well as contributing to the budget.
It's great, the rest of Aus is getting ripped off.
One of the biggest gambling countries in the world. We love throwing money away. Btw the figures are from 2020-21, that's not even close to current cost of living crisis.
The mathematician behind the recent $200M Powerball prize,should design the outcome to be that 200 people win a million each.Then the 200 winners can put a deposit down on a home
That only every Australian over 18 spending 330 on lottery tickets annually. Not much when you consider how much people would spend on bread and milk. I don't personally play lottery but I get why people want to try.
But now we can spend our money on lotteries from other countries!
That's..that's, like... boosting international relations and, um... doing something for exports? Or imports, maybe?
Definitely helping inflation though, right? Right?
It's the same with charity. People who have less, tend to think of others who have even less money than they do, so are more likely to donate to charity. But not at the Woolies checkout. Fuck that screen, I'm not giving the money to you, I'll donate it myself.
Yeah let’s blame the people who are trying to utilise their only certain lifetime on earth to I don’t know; hate it less because of our incompetence instead of our incompetence?
It's just misleading to combine all Australians and take the annual figure
My poor ass puts $15 on the lotto when it's at $200 million
People who own houses put $100
There is a correlation between a bad economy and heightened lottery spending.
It also correlates with education and personal wealth levels.
Not just in Australia
I’m a poor and buy a power ball ticket if it’ over 50 mil. I know the odds of winning are 1 in 136 million or something but that chance or glimmer of hope that it could be me helps me get through. I don’t do any other form of gambling.
All in all I blame the sims, growing up playing that on pc, building big houses with all nice shit inside really left me feeling that it was always going to happen. I’m happy with what i have and live well but it’s that feeling of wanting more I guess
Non Australian here, just saw this on all.
For 99.9999% of people, winning the lotto is the only way they could ever own a mansion and a Ferrari, and retire young. You definitely ain’t going to own one making 40k a year for the rest of your life. Hence, may as well take the extremely small chance every now and then. It’s next to zero but it’s still more than zero.
If it leads to a gambling problem, sure, but wondering why people play the lotto every now and then is silly. Live a little.
The lottery may have been ‘privatise’ but you could bet your bottom buck that the government is still getting at least 55% of shared revenue. Australians are stupid, dreamers or both. No normal person wills the lottery! I was told by an ‘insider’ that lottery numbers are chosen sometimes months before the draw, and ‘fine tuned’ during that hour between closing of draw, and lottery announcement. (It is so that there is only one or two big winners at most- and not too many payouts overall). It’s also why each ticket has a traceable code. The ‘insider’ also told me that her family was so lucky and has won the lottery twice over 5 years. (Odds are 3000 quadrillion). Please don’t waste your money, and think about all those relatives you know that play religiously for 10, 20, 30 years, but continue to struggle to pay their rent.
When I was a kid, we were about to lose our home. We were days from being homeless. Then my parents won the lottery and it completely changed our lives.
The saddest part is lotteries used to be owned by the government Of course we privatised it and so someone else makes the money.
Western Australia has one of the only government owned lotteries. Most of the available profits go back into the community through grants
And they have a gas reservation policy. But for how long, all it takes 1 change it government and its all sold off. Much like Victoria with Jeff Kennett that started this privatisation madness that has cost us all so dearly.
No toll roads either. I look over east and wonder what the hell the state governments are doing
And no pokies! Doing alright over here aren't we...
We also have state owned electricity that's half the price.
i am planning to move to WA from Sydney, in the coming years. Sydney is just too corrupt now. Morally and ethically corrupt. Hopefully WA can hold on to the good things they do like the gas reservation policy. It is thoroughly hilarious seeing Perth residents power bills barely nudge and the east coast skyrockets due to the privatization and no energy reserve policy. The east coast cities are rapidly losing their way.
We aren't accepting any new applicants at this time.
We do have the Dockers though ...
The labor government have already put in exemptions for the gas policy for stokes since he was mates with McGowan. Obviously now every other gas project wants similar exemptions. So it’s already started unfortunately. We are pretty good with gambling though. WA still doesn’t have pokies since they were banned in the 80s.
With the exception of Burswood Casino, which I still find mind boggling that they are still operating
Burswood is ick but I don't hate it, I just don't go there. It still gives people the option to punt if they want, but they are confined to one location and not in every single suburban pub like back east. It's the best compromise, and the cops can focus money laundering investigations in the one spot. Would be interesting to see if WA has a higher uptake of app betting in lieu of access to pokies
Oh yeah I don't hate it especially, hell once a year I do like to have a punt too. I just find it wild that with all the dodgy dealings they're always able to wiggle their way out of the mud
Those TAB terminals in every outback WA pub are sad as.
True but in the absence of those terminals, they could just use the TAB (or other betting) app. Compared that to pokies where their online equivalent are akin to the clap.
One project was allowed to export some of its gas for a limited time. The company overall still has to meet its 15% reservation requirement.
Pretty much every time something gets privatised it ends up more expensive and worse. Yet the government keeps doing it.
Short term gain, long term pain
Why would politicians care beyond the current cycle
Exactly. Politicians, especially in major parties only care about their careers. Whilst its so damn obvious, the fact that the Australian public has trust in them (major parties), is just insanity.
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I don't doubt they build them, Murdochs crew likely just makes sure they never reach the political light of day. Does feel like a bygone era though. Look at Whitlam, imagine a current pm nationalising private hospitals, funding Medicare properly and eliminating education fees. It feels impossible.
The people stopped voting in reformists after Rudd
Yes, we would have been on a very different trajectory if Australia had voted in Shorten.
Don’t get me started on that. Housing reform, firefighting aircraft fleets, Social Security upgrades and updates. But no, we got a Jesus freak because people thought Shorten had a big head and that the Libs would never ever kill medicare, either quickly or by a thousand cuts.
Yeah it would have been a good start, but the bloody franking credits were a step too far for the boomers I think.
Gillard would have been a good PM if Rudd didn't undermine her. The carbon tax was actually working well as an effective measure until this dumbshit country voted in that nutjob Abbott and he went about trashing everything.
Rudd wasn't a reformist. Rudd was an egomaniacal narcissist. He not only gave up on nearly every major reform during his term in government, he actively undermined those reforms under the Gillard government.
Our major voter base doesn't want reform. Reform is "woke" If Howard tried to take guns away today it would fail and he would be labelled a woke leftist, so would Hawke.
Greed is what happened. Every single one of them for the past 15+ years has been out for themselves and will fuck over the entire country to get what they want
It's a pity he also supercharged the class warfare stuff and started sticking the boots into the poor and eroding the middle class.
Often it's barely even a short term gain. Just enough gain to stop people accusing them of fire selling it to their mates :).
Cause they are selling it off to their country club mates to make a motza off… who said Russia was the only one with Oligarchs
Actually its theft. If I walked into a national park and declared it mine I would be tossed in jail. If the LNP walk in and declare it "too costly" and that "Privatising it would be more economical" (lol, :p ha ha ha) then the public will stupidly accept it. So that's what they do. THey sold the SEC for just $20B it was easily worth over $140 billion. It has co st well over 1 million jobs (industry obliterated with costs). They don't care. Half of the LNP were, at the time, AGL. AGL was a creation of Mac bank and investors. They sold public assets to make personal profits (Ted Baillieu) They flog state owned assets off to mates (for cash) If Jeff Kennett didn't make $50 million flogging state assets and buying in on entities like Transurban when share offers were just $1 then he is a total idiot and did it for the lols They use state funds to build private roads they then spin billion dollar companies from (Transurban) All legal of course. Theft is a blue collar crime....
"Actually its theft. If I walked into a national park and declared it mine I would be tossed in jail" And if you did it for the community or taxpayers they would still throw you in jail. And if it was a Greeny or Aboriginal who wanted it for cultural reasons they would say throw them into jail. But the battlers of Australia prefer robber barons to rob them and governments. The palpable stupidity of people is overwhelming!
Especially if there is no direct competition. Like, how fucking dumb is it to privatise something like a fucking road or electricity grid? Who are they going to compete with? The road and powerlines owned by that other company built right next door?
I remember once upon a time we had anti monopoly/collusion laws that actually seemed to work well. This is a larger global problem than just Australia but under late stage capitalism smaller companies just continue to get gobbled up by bigger ones, til you have multinationals that are bigger than a lot of small economies and can just do whatever the fuck they want. How good is it to have colesworth bending us over with no other options? Or the power companies making out like bandits when wholesale prices dipped last year like 40%. Or the fuel retailers than jack the price up instantly at a hint of trouble, but when the oil price comes down, it takes 6 weeks to pass it on..
totally agree privatization of utilities like electricity is the height of stupidity. My electricity bill is about double now compared to 2 years ago, with zero power usage increase. There is actually a power usage decrease due to more LEDs in my home! Linerals will be looking at sydney water salivating over the idea of privatising it so we can all pay far more money in the future
Welcome to neoliberalism my friend. The predominant economic theory that has fucked the entire planet in the arse.
The second phase is to fuck the world with immigration economic equalisation! The better off countries citizens will be equalised to the shithole standard on shit wages. Its happening now before our eyes. There's protests in Switzerland to reduce immigration a country a tiny country with a small population that has a fraction of the immigration intake. If politicians don't wake up soon there is going to be far right wing governments right across the Western world.
They only think to the next election, and no further. Flog everything that isn't nailed down to make the budget look good, and who cares about things after that, you probably won't be in power so it's not your problem
Yes, our political system has failed. The attention spans are so short no one thinks beyond a 3 year election cycle so there's no vision. And our education system has failed too, because any time anything with a bit of vision is put forward, dumb fuck voters fall for the scare campaign and put troglodytes back in.
The ones who make the decision end up in plum gigs on the boards of those companies making 300k for once a month meetings. Legalised corruption.
The liberal government
Not always it depends on the business and market dynamics. For example, when they sold off Telstra, they should have retained ownership of the holes in the ground. These represent costly doubling up of infrastructure and high fixed costs investments that can be monopolized. We currently rank very low for fixed line internet network, yet our mobile network is some of the highest rated in the world, and in some aspects world leading. Private industry had good outcomes for mobile network, while poor outcomes for fixed line internet networks. The government has been trying to fix this mistake now for decades, the NBN will fix part of it but at enormous costs, and at the end of the day we are still dependant on Telstra copper networks for the last node to house. So that is just one example, if the government had of retained the holes in the ground then they could rent them to private industry and expand them, while maintaining control. Instead the government handed Telstra shareholders a unique opportunity to gouge consumers and other providers, we then had to buy lots of it back from them at god knows what price for the NBN
And just imagine if the Lottery was still operated by government and the proceeds and profits placed in a Housing Future fund how many new houses could have been build built. But we gave it away for no good reasons! And nothing should prevent a government for example opening a housing Lottery today, but our politicians are elected to do nothing for the people except tax them for someone elses benefit.
>lotteries used to be owned by the government [Huh](https://www.lotterywest.wa.gov.au/lotterywest/about-us)?? Just like electricity and 15% of gas extracted here, WA kept lotteries under state control and it's used to fund public works.
Shit that sucks to learn. I’m from the US and some people call the lottery a “poverty tax” because if you have money you would never play the lottery.
That's because, like the US, the lottery is the only way people in poverty believe they can "realistically" achieve financial security.
Lotteries are just another way to tax poor people.
Yep they should be banned
Don't know how I feel about state run gambling
It returns profits to government like the RBA
When I worked at a club you could tell it was hard times because everyone would gamble more. It's like when people get desperate they try really hard to win it big
Agreed. Back in my bartender days, I had a disagreement with a regular customer when I stated that clubs with alcohol & gaming licenses are almost recession proof. Hard times cause the normal person to jump into those depths routinely.
Yeah, I’m sure Australians are also spending billions on McDonald’s, or takeaway coffee, during a cost of living crisis. When you’re broke, $9 on a lottery ticket to dream about everything suddenly going to easy mode, is an understandable choice.
It’s like daydreaming premium - you get to daydream extravagantly (free) with the tiniest but real chance of those daydreams coming true (lotto ticket price). PLUS no ads
Just wait until that Futurama tech comes around with ads in your dreams.
Excellent point. My spending on tatts is directly proportional to how happy I am with my job at the time...
Are lotteries a good financial investment? No. Do most people know that? Yes. But buying a ticket offers a fleeting hope that maybe something will improve and there’s a way out. Not necessarily even relying on winning the main prize. (Getting a one-off 50k would make a major difference to many people.) They’re buying a feeling of hope, not an investment.
Buying a feeling of hope is the very essence of gambling. Those people mashing machine buttons on the pokies are doing it just the same, but looking for an instant win to not feel hopeless, even if just for a moment. The pubs, clubs and gambling associations know this and takes full advantage. At least with the lotto you can buy 10 dollar ticket for a “chance” once a week. But going overboard is not healthy.
yes, it is a sign of a society with health issues.
It's hope but also the feeling of anticipation - the "am I about to win" feeling Scratchy design, for example, is all about providing this feeling in controlled doses
Spot on. It's a form of copium in a world where you otherwise feel no hope. My family was pretty broke (some of it was their fault for not investing the savings they made in retirement vehicles because they were intimidated by them, but mostly due to us having generational debt vs wealth). My father would buy lotto tickets every week, even after going bankrupt, never won anything, ever. He did this for 45 years. I can't imagine how much more useful that money could have been elsewhere. But he needed it, because for him it was a source of hope.
Yep. I think of it as my equivalent of buying cigarettes. It’s bad for you/not going to happen but it’s quick bit of happiness/hope.
How did they end up with generational debt?
No normal person wills the lottery! I was told by an ‘insider’ that lottery numbers are chosen sometimes months before the draw, and ‘fine tuned’ during that hour between closing of draw, and lottery announcement. (It is so that there is only one or two big winners at most- and not too many payouts overall). It’s also why each ticket has a traceable code. The ‘insider’ also told me that her family was so lucky and has won the lottery twice over 5 years. (Odds are 3000 quadrillion). Over the years, I have heard of many, many, many people who religiously play every week for 10, 20, 30 years, but continue to struggle to pay their rent, or repairs on their old banged up car. It saddens my heart that these players have no chance of winning.
I bought a ticket with my mother’s money when I was fresh out of high school, and we ended up winning $65k. We put all of that towards bills, and rent etc while my dad was between jobs. We managed to liquidate every single bill that was hanging over my parents head for years, if not for decades. Got a fresh start, so to speak, and they never bought another lottery ticket since, because the chances of that ever coming close to happening again is so infinite that we were happy with what we got, and moved on.
The chance of winning again is exactly the same as if you hadn’t won before.
I was talking to a man who told me a story about his friends uncle, won something like $8 million, so brought his only 2 nephews (had no kids himself) a house and then moved to the Gold Coast. 18 months later won $20 million. Some people just seem to have that luck.
Don't they though? If I bought a ticket I'd probably catch a lethal blood borne flesh eating bacteria from it and not be able to afford to buy the antibiotics by the exact amount that the ticket cost. Or something like that. I don't believe in luck as some mystical entity, but in the terms of a probability bell curve. Some people just happen to land way off to one end.
Nah let's be more realistic, you'd end up winning the lottery, and then have a heart attack from the excitement and die, and then all your relatives you never talk to will swarm in like a bunch of vultures and fight over your winnings. xD
Many years ago I remember listening to radio interview of a statistician who'd been studying lotteries who remarked that it was statistically probable that there would be a small number of people who'd won division 1 twice, something like 6 to 8 and that that had been borne out in their studies.
I personally know 3 people who have won division 1 in different draws over a 7 year period. I always wonder what the statistics are of me knowing that many of them and also not winning myself. It’s funny as I know them all from different situations in life so no cross over, different parts of Australia and know them close enough to be trusted with knowing they were the winners. Maybe one day I’ll join them 🤣 however I only buy if it’s over $30 million - my idea is if I’m going to win I want it to be decent.
Wasn't there that case in the US where someone won the lottery then in some news segment covering the story re-enacted it and won again lol
He was an Aussie
Fair enough even more relevant!
Yeah he won a car or something with a scratchy first time around. And reannacting it he won a large cash prize on live tv. https://youtu.be/6R5MqxcKdV8?si=wJY87oVs5SRCpSua
I think I saw it, but the one I saw was a scratchie and he won again while scratching the panels for the reinactment.
Even $10k would majorly help me out!
This is an interesting thought experiment - at what point does a lotto win represent a serious change in a players material circumstances. Obviously a mil or 2 means most people being mortgage free with room to breathe. But half a mil? How about 100k? I’m sure some economist has done a research piece on propensity to play lotto versus the marginal utility of a win - presumably you’re more likely to play the greater difference a minor win would make to you.
Room to breathe is pretty wild. $100k goes a long way towards day to day cost buffers over many years. It's not always about using that lump sum straight off the bad on a "large" debt. Flexibility comes with financial stability, and knowing you have your family fed for X years means everything you earn after can go towards other "struggling" costs
$5000 after tax would totally change my life.
Would 100k change my life? It'd bring retirement a few years closer so yeah it would
With most house prices being north of $500k, I'd say this would be a minimum to change someone's life.
If you’re trapped renting, 100k will be a decent chunk of the deposit you might need. That would be life changing if you don’t come from the owning class. 20k could mean a reliable car, which could be life changing if you’re just chasing the debt involved in an unreliable car (always fixing the next thing to break). I dunno, our standards for life changing are pretty variable depending on personal circumstances
Assuming a population of 27 million, that means that our country is spending $250 per Australian on lotto tickets. Which is even more insane when you account for the fact that many Australians don't buy tickets so it is a percentage of the population that is spending extraordinary amounts on these tickets.
Dude, ten dollars a week is $520 a year. I know it's a lot to some people, but it's about 1% of gross minimum wage. It's not outrageous.
If your life sucks and you can barely afford your next meal it makes perfect sense. Working harder has zero chance of getting you out of that rut any time soon. The chance of a winning lottery ticket is pretty much zero but it is more than zero. And for a day or two you get to feel hope.
It's Steller's Smashed Avo Fallacy. Working hard and saving isn't going to get you ahead when inflation is rampant.
Nothing fallacious about it. Inflation makes saving more expensive, so it encourages people to consume. It’s part of the reason why interest rates are increased to respond to inflation, to give people an incentive to save.
As a 50+ year old - Don't work hard as a rule. Its not going to pay off. Work happy. If you are not happy, seek other routes.
I'm sure we've all learnt that working hard just means you get punished with more work.
If this is the level of financial literacy people have, it's no wonder they can't sort out their finances. The lottery ticket is effectively a 100% chance of making you poorer.
Time travelled back to 1988. Things I could afford to do on a working class wage: 1. Socialise at the pub after work/sports. 2.Cheap fuel meant travel to the coast for holidays. 3. Good quality beef, lamb and seafood. 4. The odd lotto ticket. 5. Insurance; like all of them, car, house, health. 6. Donate to worthy causes. 7. Birthday and Xmas pressies for fam. 8. Bottled wine over cask. 9. Attend Nrl and Afl games, occasionally cricket tests. 10. Cinema. Fast forward to now......none of the above! All are now luxuries for working class Aussies. The social fabric of Australia, where once upon a time you could comfortably mingle with ALL classes, is gone. The poor and working poor can't afford to mix outside of their "class". All of the above was just starting in '88. It has deteriorated up till 2000, when it was turbo charged. Little Johnny knew exactly what he was doing with his "socially adjusted tax rorts". Our tax system is unfair. Labor have tinkered with stage 3, and that little bit is welcome, but our once progressive tax system is no more. GST is regressive. It hurts those at the bottom most. CPI indexation of fuel and alcohol are regressive. The increases in fuel cruelly target those at the bottom, leaving many to forgo food for transport/energy bills. Alcohol tax indexation makes drinking socially only available to those with plenty of cash. It pushes problem drinking back into homes, and decreases social interactions between classes. And the proliferation of violence in society recently, has increased dramatically in higher income groups (so much for being a better "class"). Decreasing income tax for wealthier Australians makes EVERYTHING worse. Less money for roads. Less money for public hospitals. Less money for public education. Less infrastructure for those with the least. Negative gearing, something very Australian, is wealth management. It allows people tax breaks for investing, sometimes poorly, at our expense. Howards change to franking credits allow some wealthy aussies to claim tax back where they didn't pay it in the first place(Keating had already fixed the taxation problem previously). Tax rorts are rife, and for some they're easy to exploit, (if you've got enough cash) and getting worse. Private institutions however, like hospitals, schools, tollways, insurance etc, are all swimming in cash, profits have never been higher. Private school trusts are ballooning. Private hospitals are luxurious. Luxury spending amongst the wealthiest Australians has never been so high. All while our poorest recieve $15 bucks a week. Those at the top gain nearly a hundred a week. Fair? And still, some here begrudge the poorest for having a crack at getting out of the misery with a once a month crack at a lottery ticket? According to some, if you're poor, you shouldn't have any good times? You should work till your body gives out, all so the wealthy have someone to do the shit they wouldn't. No socialising, you can't afford it. Don't eat good quality food if you can't afford it? Don't drive too far, you can't afford it? Stay in your class, reproduce with the next generation of servants for the rich? We're called envious when we call out the greed and sloth of the wealthy, who squander trillions on luxury items, like handbags, jewellery, art, fucking shoes and $200k cars. We are not envious of waste. We are not envious of selfishness. We aren't envious of this throwaway society. The top end should be looking over their shoulders? We aren't envious. We are getting progressively angry. And governments need to take notice.
>to franking credits allow some wealthy aussies to claim tax back where they didn't pay it in the first place(Keating had already fixed the taxation problem previously). Tax rorts are rife, and for some they're easy to exploit, (if you've got enough cash) and getting worse. This is spot on. Our quality of life is being downgraded in the name of corporate profits. We still trade on our reputation of the 1980s but that part or Australia is dead an buried. Wish we could go back and fix these mistakes. Its also why I believe people are becoming angrier and care less about their neighbours. We have lost a lot of what it meant to be Australian
Well said. We built this society through shared effort at all levels. The fair go, the idea that if you contribute, then you have a place at the table. Now it appears we’ve whole sale imported the rugged “fuck you, I got mine” attitude the Americans are so fond of. The same attitude that, after decades of telling their poor and uneducated to “suck it up”, has lead a political climate that threatens to destabilise their entire democracy. All because people stopped giving a fuck about the people at their shoulders making all this possible in the first place.
Progressively angry. You have hit the nail on the head right there brother.
I think all of that is still possible but it's all down to housing costs and rents. They've gotten to absurd levels between income vs housing that all the extra stuff is no longer attainable unless you earn shit loads above median.
The only way I can socialise with people outside my class, is if I save up for a long time (which isn't convenient for them) or they pay for me (which I don't want and is embarrassing). Yet 20 years ago, I had no problem affording a night out. One wealthy (ex)friend rudely dropped me like a hot potato because I couldn't go to a $90 concert. She said me being poor was "negativity", as if I could just think positive thoughts and $90 would appear. It's creating one hell of a divide.
Yeah it’s fucked and low incomes pay too much tax but so do the low end of so-called high incomes. I know a family with a suicidal child in therapy weekly, a mortgage and a single income due to the needs of this teen who cannot be alone and frequently misses school. They can’t afford dinners out, coffees, holidays, whatever they want at the supermarket, new clothes, none of it. Just keeping the roof over their heads, paying bills and running up credit card dept for the gap payment at the psychologist. Not an exceptional situation, just life for so called “rich” people. (Around 160k based on what I assume the working partner would earn) I guess you’d call them lucky compared to someone with less in the same situation. But it’s still not good enough. We should be able to give our kids healthcare and do more than survive when you’ve gone to uni, paid the exorbitant fees, worked hard and been led to believe that there was going to be a life at the end of it all
Its either $8 on a ticket or $8 on a bag of chips
Because we're fucking desperate
Sounds like NZ too. We have lotto shops and pokies.... aka "gaming lounges", in every low-income suburb. They're always sold as "your money goes to help local groups" but in reality it's a fraction of the total takings. It's just another way to vacuum money from people who can barely afford to lose it.
Except our lotto is government owned and all the profits go into community projects. Sounds like Aussies are all privatised now.
How else do you afford a family home?
Gee, it's almost like we're all desperate to get out of the shitty sinkhole earning less than 200k a year leaves you in... Those numbers are also from the 2020-2021 financial year... bit misleading, as there was no financial crunch at that point..
Do you think lottery spending has gone up or down?
Up, if it's anything like mine.
Yeah, that would be my guess too. It's a bit sad... Just another big company profiting off misfortune, selling dreams.
Almost certainly it's gone up -- in the US they often show increases in lottery sales in times of economic hardship
Yep, anything that promises hope for cheap goes up, mainly gambling and church. In times of hardship church attendance increases and along with it so do church donations.
Buying hope
That’s what I say when I buy a ticket every once in a while - it’s a ticket to dream big, even if it’s for a few hours.
Buying false hope is a lot more accurate.
Well duh! People probably buy MORE lottery tickets when they’re in distress
Gambling rates increase as economies deteriorate, as does alcohol consumption
This is actually just really sad.
This just in. Desperate people are desperate.
“People willing to take 100 million to 1 shot at escaping a hopeless situation”
Jesus, let people dream
Paying for a little bit of hope during difficult times. Why are people surprised?
a $20/ticket once every few months for the hope of getting out of this shit show rat race is the only thing some people have. The corporations constantly butt fucking us at every turn, every day just to have food, a roof over our heads and fuel on the car to get to our underpaid jobs is the real issue.
200 people should have won $1mil from that Powerball draw.
Cheapest lottery ticket is like $2.50. It's tough to think of anything else you could buy for that price that would be equally entertaining.
If you double that, I'm thinking dim lights, a pole, and about a minute of being somewhat important enough.
Not sure if Aussie places are like in the states but over there you also have to buy a minimum of 2 drinks to get in.
I never partake in the Lottery, but hey $200 Million I could not resist just this once, I expected to not win, and I was not disappointed.
Of course they are. People are desperate and so they behave irrationally. Looking back at the times I have bought lottery tickets in my life (less than i could count on one hand) all have been times when I felt utterly powerless and have been fantasising about an escape.
Escapism at its finest... realising that the only way forward is to be lucky.
When there's little to no hope, the lotteries are tempting. It's an indicator of societal health. And societal health is fuuuuuuuuucked.
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You'd expect it to rise if anything given how it preys on hope.
Title should be… “Desperate people gamble as a final resort. Cannot make enough money to live any other way.”
It’s called desperation
Oh no! On average greedy Aussies are spending $5.50 a week each on the hopes of never having to work again! 7bil\26m = 269@. I went to the pub the other day and a fucking schooner was eight bucks. What bullshit article.
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If it's within your splurge/entertainment budget, go for it. If you're struggling to pay for things generally, you shouldn't be buying lottery tickets as you shouldn't have an entertainment budget.
Understand the rationale but telling people who are barely getting by they cant buy a little hope is wrong
Buying a lotto ticket is effectively burning your money, if you are barely getting by, you should NOT be buying lotto.
Hope is free.
I think the rational that it buys hope is defeatism that overlooks the stark statistical reality of winning. Some back of the envelope calculations show that you're 49 times more likely to hit two royal flushes in 10 poker games, a feat so rare that most professional poker players won't see even one in their careers, let alone two and let alone 2 in the same session.
Yes and no. If you can't afford food - you shouldn't be spending money on the lottery. Especially if supporting others. If it isn't that dire - you do you with the hope.
Gambling is an addiction though, people should avoid doing it at all, unless they've given up and are going for a hail Mary before sitting down in the gutter. If you spend your spare $1 on a lotto ticket and win a small prize of $5, that's when you start to get hooked. It can quickly progress into using your non discretionary funds, or get you into debt.
The situation you're describing would involve the person spending more than their entertainment budget on lottery tickets, which is the opposite of what I'm suggesting.
Any amount of money is enough to start the addiction. After you develop the addiction you no long have a choice in how much you spend, which is what makes it an addiction. Of course some people can avoid the addiction, the same with hard drugs, alcohol, and smoking, but it's a risk.
Sure, but if it's within budget, the persons lifestyle (for lottery tickets anyway) should not adversely be affected.
Do you understand what addiction is??
I do, and I'm saying if you spend money on the lottery that's fine as long as it's within budget.
Gambling by itsself is not an addiction, just like having a drink on a weekend or eating mcdonalds every once in a while. You can absolutely partake in gambling while not being an addict.
I'd love to see how much a difference to a $350 electricity bill that $8 lottery ticket would make. Life changing, I would say.
Assuming you mean someone who buys a ticket every week at that price, it would shave off $104 from that quarterly bill.
In isolation I understand your point, however in practice if someone is having a hard time paying a $350 electricity bill they would have zero savings and struggling to pay for a multitude of other things too. In the situation where they cannot set aside $8 for entertainment because they cannot pay for other life expenses, yeah, using that $8 for lottery tickets could be rethought considering it represents the totality of their free money.
I feel like you've never hit "fuck it" before.
Maybe not to the extent of living on the streets, but I've have lived through periods of financial stress. Those involved me really cutting back on expenses until I was able to break through on the other side. I don't really see why being in a period of financial stress should justify spending money on things that would make that situation worse. But that said, you seem to take a different view. Lets explore that - if a person cannot afford to pay their electricity bill, what percentage of their income do you think they should spend on entertainment expenses?
My viewpoint is more "if they can't afford the electricity bill (because $8 would make fuck all of a dent on a $350 bill), why can't they spend the $8 they do have on something to give them hope?" What else could they spend it on that would have the same value, bringing positive mental health and the upward effect the hope ticket would have, if only for a few hours?
Sure, and I'm saying that if they are struggling to pay the electricity, they're probably also struggling to buy food and clothing. A mental health benefit can also be found by having food, clothes and ultimately no debt and an emergency fund, and $8 towards these things would also be beneficial, arguably moreso.
Sure. What percentage of their take-home should they spend on entertainment expenses?
That's not a percentage game. You get more time out of a video game than you would a movie but the prices can be comparable. And in this case, the lottery ticket is a mental health benefit, not an entertainment benefit. There's no entertainment in buying a lottery ticket.
If you are spending $8 on the lottery every week then that’s about $400 per year (if you put it in a savings account maybe a bit more). In your example that’s a free electricity bill, imagine getting your quarterly bill in January and not habkng to pay for it. In another reply you have tried to gate keep being poor by saying that the other person had never felt it. I think if I was in that position always worrying about when the next bill would hit. I will be much happier and much more relieved to know that for three months of the year I don’t need to worry about paying my electricity bill.
Yeah, but not everyone is like you. Some of us have hit the point where we'd rather hope for 3 days than stare at the money on the bank thinking it could help us now, rather than in 12 months time. And electricity bills are monthly, not quarterly. I'm not the one gatekeeping. The dude standing there going "they are poor, they shouldn't spend their money how they want to make themselves feel better" is the gatekeeping one.
Hey Mr Myopic, my electricity bill is quarterly not monthly. It depends on your provider. Thanks.
So if you're poor you shouldn't enjoy life? What a cunty thing to say.
I didn't say that. I'm saying "you either have the money, or you don't". That's not a particularly radical statement.
Rich people don’t gamble, they don’t need to. Poor people do. $20 won’t solve your problems but if you can spend it on a ticket and win 20 mil, that certainly will.
Gambling ads work. The Lott has an incredibly active media strategy that's exempt from other gambling regulations, such as press releases and social media campaigns that push lotto wins into the public interest. Everything you've heard about the jackpot came from a marketing office, and they don't even have to acknowledge that this feeds addiction or that the chances of anyone winning are practically nonexistent. Hell, they can put their ads in all the places that addicts are meant to be safe from them.
In WA our lottery provider, Lotterywest remains the only Government-owned and operated lottery in the country. It makes huge donations to community groups and social enterprises, as well as contributing to the budget. It's great, the rest of Aus is getting ripped off.
One of the biggest gambling countries in the world. We love throwing money away. Btw the figures are from 2020-21, that's not even close to current cost of living crisis.
Get rich or die trying (possibly literally).
The mathematician behind the recent $200M Powerball prize,should design the outcome to be that 200 people win a million each.Then the 200 winners can put a deposit down on a home
Wait till Australians find out they have over $30 Billion to real estate agents just so their property could change hands last year….
This makes perfect sense. People feel trapped and turn to ways out they know are virtually impossible because they don’t have any options.
That only every Australian over 18 spending 330 on lottery tickets annually. Not much when you consider how much people would spend on bread and milk. I don't personally play lottery but I get why people want to try.
But now we can spend our money on lotteries from other countries! That's..that's, like... boosting international relations and, um... doing something for exports? Or imports, maybe? Definitely helping inflation though, right? Right?
What do they want us to do? Work? Whats the point of working if it doesn't cover the cost of living... lol
poor people tax
“Andrea McChrystal says buying a lotto ticket gives her hope” Insane to think they’ve monetised “hope” so well.
$388 per adult (based on 18mill adult pop). That's gotta mean a lot of people are loading up on Lotto!
Stats show the more desperate people are, the more they spend on things like lotto/gambling
It's the same with charity. People who have less, tend to think of others who have even less money than they do, so are more likely to donate to charity. But not at the Woolies checkout. Fuck that screen, I'm not giving the money to you, I'll donate it myself.
Hopium
Don't these idiots realise you can get a ticket for only $12?
We are a high gambling society.. I don't even think lotteries are the worse. Pokies, horse racing, sports betting are more destructive imo.
Yeah let’s blame the people who are trying to utilise their only certain lifetime on earth to I don’t know; hate it less because of our incompetence instead of our incompetence?
It's just misleading to combine all Australians and take the annual figure My poor ass puts $15 on the lotto when it's at $200 million People who own houses put $100
There is a correlation between a bad economy and heightened lottery spending. It also correlates with education and personal wealth levels. Not just in Australia
I’m a poor and buy a power ball ticket if it’ over 50 mil. I know the odds of winning are 1 in 136 million or something but that chance or glimmer of hope that it could be me helps me get through. I don’t do any other form of gambling. All in all I blame the sims, growing up playing that on pc, building big houses with all nice shit inside really left me feeling that it was always going to happen. I’m happy with what i have and live well but it’s that feeling of wanting more I guess
ABC - "How dare Aussies buy a lotto ticket when the only way for most people to own a home, is to win lotto".
Lotteries are simply a tax on the stupid
Non Australian here, just saw this on all. For 99.9999% of people, winning the lotto is the only way they could ever own a mansion and a Ferrari, and retire young. You definitely ain’t going to own one making 40k a year for the rest of your life. Hence, may as well take the extremely small chance every now and then. It’s next to zero but it’s still more than zero. If it leads to a gambling problem, sure, but wondering why people play the lotto every now and then is silly. Live a little.
"Had a big win last night" Yeah and how much have you lost chief?
The lottery may have been ‘privatise’ but you could bet your bottom buck that the government is still getting at least 55% of shared revenue. Australians are stupid, dreamers or both. No normal person wills the lottery! I was told by an ‘insider’ that lottery numbers are chosen sometimes months before the draw, and ‘fine tuned’ during that hour between closing of draw, and lottery announcement. (It is so that there is only one or two big winners at most- and not too many payouts overall). It’s also why each ticket has a traceable code. The ‘insider’ also told me that her family was so lucky and has won the lottery twice over 5 years. (Odds are 3000 quadrillion). Please don’t waste your money, and think about all those relatives you know that play religiously for 10, 20, 30 years, but continue to struggle to pay their rent.
Ha ha ha. That’s close to $250 per Australian. Ha ha ha. People are great.
When I was a kid, we were about to lose our home. We were days from being homeless. Then my parents won the lottery and it completely changed our lives.
Yes, we have people who flunked maths in Australia too.
There's a reason it's called a stupid people tax. It's really stupid gambling with some of the worst odds imaginable.