Buying and scratching instant lottery tickets is something which almost everyone did at once or another. For some folks it’s probably something they do too often. I guess for me, the bad buying habit is junk food. If I’d spent my extra cash on instant lottery tickets over the years, I could have been rich right now as opposed to overweight. Like anything, whether it’s food or gambling one need to do it in moderation, and that’s often difficult to do.
Within the state of Pennsylvania where I live, the initial scratch off ticket arrived in 1975, and they’ve been a large hit every since.
I have obtained instant lottery tickets of each and every available price range within my state. I usually buy the $1 – $2 tickets, but once in awhile I obtain a $5 – $10 ticket, and one time, I purchased a $20 instant ticket. I won nothing on the $20 ticket, not even $1 or a FREE ticket, so which was like throwing out my $20. You would believe that with having to spend that much money, they’d give everyone at least a FREE $1 ticket or something. I believed afterwards that I was kind of foolish for spending and losing the $20 on a single ticket, but heck as they say, “If you don’t play, you can’t win !”, it had been a risk, and I didn’t win that time. I’ve known two folks who each won near $20,000 on instant lottery tickets. So I will say without a doubt, “yes, some folks do win it big.”
Unlike the live lottery that’s usually drawn by picking numbers, the instant lottery is pre-determined months ahead of it’s release. The tickets are made and printed, then they are distributed to the lottery retailers through the state. Most small convenience stores offer instant lottery tickets, in addition to the large chain stores. You can usually locate them in a vending machine with multiple styles and prices to pick from, or they are at the cashiers area on the counter or behind a shielded section. Instant lottery tickets sell for as little as $1 and as high as $20 each in many states of the U.S. however many states might have tickets that sell for even a lot more than $20 each.luckybet678
States do instant lotteries to simply help fund many different programs. As an example in Pennsylvania, the lottery is employed to generate funds to benefit programs for the Commonwealth’s older residents. In Ohio, since 1974, the Lottery has provided a lot more than $13 billion to public education. Annually, the lottery provides about 4.5 percent of the funding required for Ohio’s public education. In Missouri, approximately 27.3 cents of each and every dollar spent on the Lottery benefits education programs; 61.6 cents dates back to players as prizes, 5 cents is useful for administrative costs and 6.1 cents goes to retailers in the form of commissions, incentives and bonuses. In most, a lot more than 93 cents of each and every dollar stays in Missouri. It’s different for every single state, but the lottery is quite beneficial inspite of the few problems it may cause with a, in the form of gambling addictions.
Most folks buy instant (scratch off) tickets, and when they don’t win anything, they throw the tickets in the trash. Did you realize that every time you throw a losing instant lottery ticket in the trash, you’re throwing money away ? Yes, you can find literally hundreds if not tens and thousands of folks all over the world that would love to get your tickets from you. I have experienced losing lottery tickets sell for as high as $15 each, they were tickets that had no redeemable value. I once went to a nearby convenience store and asked them if I could have a bag of losing instant lottery tickets I saw they had on the floor behind the counter. The clerk gladly gave them in my experience, I took the tickets home and after checking through them all, I found two that have been $1 winners that have been not redeemed, and I sold the rest of the losing tickets for $30, and the store was just going to throw them away.
Where did I sell them ? On eBay. I happened to appear 1 day and I noticed there clearly was losing instant lottery tickets for sale on the eBay auction website. There are folks selling non-winning, so called ‘worthless’ lottery tickets on eBay most of the time. I recently did a research now while writing this information, and I found over 100 different auction listings for them. Who buys these non-winning lottery tickets ? Collectors.
Instant Lottery Ticket collecting is fast learning to be a big thing. There are groups and individuals all all over the world, that love collecting lottery tickets. There are many websites, discussion groups and forums now only for lottery ticket collecting. In fact there’s even a fresh term or term for an instant lottery ticket collector: LOTOLOGIST, and the instant lottery ticket collecting hobby is named: LOTOLOGY. To see how big this hobby is now just visit your preferred search engine, such as GOOGLE, and do a seek out: lotologist OR lotology. And you’ll find many sites collecting, selling and buying used non-winning instant lottery tickets.
Winning the Lottery: The First National Lottery
In the centre 18th century, a notable event occurred in France. Due to the prospect of fixing the results in privately operated lotteries, Giacomo Girolamo Casanova (1725 – 1798) persuaded Louis XV of France to found the initial state-owned monopoly lottery, the Loterie Royale of the Military School, which became the forerunner of the Loterie Nationale. Other lotteries in France were outlawed. The lottery was a Keno style game, where players could select 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 numbers between 1 and 90. (Incidentally, Casanova owned an interest in the new lottery and became wealthy as a result, but sold his interest shortly afterwards and lost the proceeds through unwise investments; sounds the same as some modern lottery winners, doesn’t it?)
Origin of American Lotteries
In the 18th century, lotteries were well under way in America, primarily to fund some venture or as a means out of debt. The first began in Massachusetts in 1744 due to military debts. The first national lottery was started by the Continental Congress in 1776 to boost funds for the American Revolution. The Founding Fathers were concerned not so much with how to win the lottery but with how to boost funds using lotteries. Most of the Founding Fathers played and sponsored lotteries:
- Benjamin Franklin used lotteries to finance cannons for the Revolutionary War.
- Thomas Jefferson, who was $80,000 in debt at the end of his life, used a lottery to dispose of all of his property. Winning this lottery could have given you a priceless bit of American heritage!
- John Hancock operated a lottery to finance the rebuild of historic Faneuil Hall in Boston.
- George Washington financed construction of the Mountain Road, which opened expansion West of Virginia, by operating a lottery.
Furthermore, public lotteries helped build several American universities, including Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Princeton, Brown and Dartmouth. Winning these lotteries was a major contribution to the continuing future of American education.