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How Lotteries Work · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you Should Know
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Speaker 1: from House Stuff Works dot com? Hey, and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast Josh Clark Chuck Bryant. Stuff you should Know?
0:20
Speaker 1: You think? It does not sound like a current affair
0:26
Speaker 1: one of those tabloid shows hard copy? Remember that? Yeah?
0:29
Speaker 1: Are they still around? I think some of them are, Thankfully,
0:33
Speaker 1: I don't watch television at four thirty pm. No, you
0:36
Speaker 1: have a job. I wouldn't know. Yeah. Here in Georgia,
0:39
Speaker 1: we had this thing called the Hope Grant. I think
0:41
Speaker 1: we still do. I think so. We're like, if you
0:43
Speaker 1: keep a B plus average or more uh in high school,
0:47
Speaker 1: if you graduate with the B plus average and you
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Speaker 1: can maintain it through college, you get a free ride
0:51
Speaker 1: to a state school and it's funded by the lountry. Yeah.
0:54
Speaker 1: That came along after I was there. It was it
0:56
Speaker 1: was it started actually when I went to college. I
0:59
Speaker 1: think it was the first year. UM, and they there
1:03
Speaker 1: have been tons and tons of studies done on who's
1:06
Speaker 1: going to college, and it's generally white, upper middle class
1:09
Speaker 1: kids who are benefiting from the Hope scholarship. And then
1:12
Speaker 1: it's poor minorities who are playing the lotto in effect
1:16
Speaker 1: putting um white kids through college who who whose parents
1:21
Speaker 1: could otherwise pay for it. Yeah. A lot of people
1:23
Speaker 1: have called the attacks on the poor and definitely the
1:25
Speaker 1: ant the anti robin hood take from the poor and
1:28
Speaker 1: give to the rich. Should we talk about some stats?
1:31
Speaker 1: Should get that out of the way. Yeah, I've got
1:33
Speaker 1: a few for you, josh Um. There is one study
1:36
Speaker 1: in California where they have shown that the racial and
1:42
Speaker 1: household income lines match up with how how California is divided.
1:48
Speaker 1: So sure has that been disputed at all? Yeah? People
1:51
Speaker 1: are saying they're cooking the books. They'll last questions like
1:54
Speaker 1: have you played the lottery in the last month, But
1:56
Speaker 1: they don't say have you bought fifteen scratch off tickets
2:00
Speaker 1: per day? Yeah, that's a good point, so they don't
2:02
Speaker 1: really dive in there. I was reading a story I
2:05
Speaker 1: think from CBS News Texas in two thousand and seven.
2:07
Speaker 1: They found that um blacks and Hispanics play the lottery
2:12
Speaker 1: twice as much as whites do, regardless of class. Yes,
2:17
Speaker 1: and scratch off tickets are apparently the crack cocaine of
2:20
Speaker 1: lottery in Texas is the first state to offer a
2:24
Speaker 1: fifty dollar scratch off ticket. Holy cow, you pay fifty
2:27
Speaker 1: bucks to buy this thing. Have you ever gone on
2:29
Speaker 1: like a little scratch off bender? I have before, And
2:32
Speaker 1: when you get into the grips of it, you might
2:34
Speaker 1: as well be huffing ether. There's no way out. Well,
2:37
Speaker 1: it's Massachusetts. One third of the calls to the gambling
2:40
Speaker 1: Addiction hotline or from lottery players. Really, yeah, I don't
2:43
Speaker 1: play it. I'm surprised it's just a third. Actually. Yeah.
2:47
Speaker 1: It's like um, alcoholism and beer. You can buy beer,
2:52
Speaker 1: you can buy liquor, and in a lot of states
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Speaker 1: you have to buy it from a state store. This
2:57
Speaker 1: is the same thing. These are state run vice operations, basically, yeah,
3:02
Speaker 1: pretty much, and their people have a real problem with them.
3:05
Speaker 1: But you know, the states just making so much cash
3:08
Speaker 1: off of these things that they aren't really doing a
3:11
Speaker 1: whole lot about it. Yeah, and here's the other thing.
3:14
Speaker 1: Before we get on with just what the lottery is,
3:16
Speaker 1: we should talk about a little more mouthfeasance. Apparently not
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Speaker 1: very much money at all is going to K through
3:22
Speaker 1: twelve education. Oh yeah, most lotteries go towards education. That's
3:26
Speaker 1: how the college. Yeah, it's all going to college. They
3:29
Speaker 1: said that less than one percent in um, half of
3:33
Speaker 1: the states that played the lottery go to K to twelve.
3:36
Speaker 1: And the other hinky thing is they they sell it
3:41
Speaker 1: to you as a as a benefit for education, like
3:44
Speaker 1: all over the marketing, but the legislation now many states
3:47
Speaker 1: are starting to kind of use it for whatever they
3:48
Speaker 1: want according to their budget, Like in Missouri. When it started,
3:52
Speaker 1: I think it was like was supposed to go towards education,
3:56
Speaker 1: and now it's like thirty and they use it for
3:58
Speaker 1: budget shortfalls and whatever they need, they'll just rewrite the
4:01
Speaker 1: Law's grim. That's really grim, especially when you consider all
4:05
Speaker 1: the people who are just blowing cash on scratch off
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Speaker 1: tickets or lotto tickets and have like real gambling problems. Huh.
4:13
Speaker 1: So that's the controversy. Uh. And actually this problem goes
4:17
Speaker 1: back pretty far, right to the sixteenth century, I believe
4:20
Speaker 1: Florence Ferenz. Yeah, that's where the lotto comes from. And
4:25
Speaker 1: I think the term lotto is based on lots, like
4:29
Speaker 1: drawing lots, game of chance, luck. Yes, right, um. And
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Speaker 1: so the first lotto that anybody is aware of where
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Speaker 1: there was a cash prize given out was the lotto
4:39
Speaker 1: deferenze you want to say, uh, And that was again
4:45
Speaker 1: in the sixteenth century in Italy. Um and in the
4:49
Speaker 1: US we've always had something of a little bit of
4:52
Speaker 1: a fever for the lotto, haven't we. Yeah. Apparently the
4:55
Speaker 1: Colony of Virginia was founded by raise money from lotteries,
5:01
Speaker 1: and there were two hundred lotteries permitted between seventeen forty
5:05
Speaker 1: four and the Revolutionary War that funded Rhodes libraries, colleges, bridges, churches. Yeah,
5:11
Speaker 1: a lot of them were for civic projects, right, yeah, yeah.
5:14
Speaker 1: And Princeton and Columbia Universities were built on a lot
5:18
Speaker 1: of money. Did you know that I did in Latin
5:21
Speaker 1: I can't remember what it's what it is in latin Um,
5:24
Speaker 1: but the crest for Princeton it translates to Daddy needs
5:30
Speaker 1: in New Parachutes. And there's some dice on this shield.
5:35
Speaker 1: I know. If you have fifteen grand you can go
5:36
Speaker 1: to eBay and buy a lottery ticket with George Washington
5:39
Speaker 1: signature on it. Sweet, pretty cool, huh. Yeah. So I
5:42
Speaker 1: had no idea that lotteries were this entrenched in the
5:46
Speaker 1: founding of our country, all right, Well, they they kind
5:48
Speaker 1: of fell out of favor I imagine probably in part
5:51
Speaker 1: because of the temperance movement in the nineteenth century. Temperance uh,
5:57
Speaker 1: and then in the twentieth century. But the mid twentieth
6:00
Speaker 1: century lotto fever could not be suppressed. The inoculations ran
6:04
Speaker 1: out and everybody was like, give me some tickets, and
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Speaker 1: New Hampshire live the way in nineteen sixty four with
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Speaker 1: its first state run lottery of the century. I mean,
6:14
Speaker 1: I don't play the lottery myself at all, but I
6:16
Speaker 1: definitely see the irresistible lure of a dollar winning you
6:21
Speaker 1: millions of dollars. I don't know, man, let's just get
6:25
Speaker 1: this out of the way. Would you want to win
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Speaker 1: the lottery honestly? Mm hmm. And if so, what's what's
6:31
Speaker 1: the minimum amount you would have to win to not
6:34
Speaker 1: just below it? You know, I'm gonna say now, I
6:37
Speaker 1: wouldn't want to either, because, uh, stress and anxiety and complications.
6:42
Speaker 1: I'm just I want to make my life, keep it
6:44
Speaker 1: as simple as possible, and that would do that would
6:46
Speaker 1: just complicate everything. Oh, it definitely wouldn't. And all kinds
6:49
Speaker 1: of jerks come out of the woodwork, and yeah, I
6:52
Speaker 1: think you're kind of like, I don't have an uncle
6:54
Speaker 1: from Venezuela, right exactly. Well, I guess it's possible this
6:59
Speaker 1: guy wouldn't. He's saying it was my uncle. So I
7:01
Speaker 1: get here's some money I should invest in his coffee
7:04
Speaker 1: bean field, right exactly, or you know, get some Nigerian
7:08
Speaker 1: general out of trouble via email. Um So, Chuck, I
7:12
Speaker 1: would not necessarily want to win the lotto either, unless
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Speaker 1: it was such a vast amount that I couldn't possibly
7:19
Speaker 1: run through it, and I'd probably go off and travel
7:21
Speaker 1: or do whatever. Yeah. I'm also one of those jerk
7:23
Speaker 1: offs who thinks that like, working for your money is
7:27
Speaker 1: kind of the thing to do. Chuck works sid for
7:30
Speaker 1: his money. You know, I would feel like I think
7:32
Speaker 1: I'd be very unfulfilled if someone just gave me a polocash,
7:35
Speaker 1: right yeah. And that's an excellent point too, because if
7:37
Speaker 1: you think about it, Let's say you did win a
7:38
Speaker 1: million dollars. Let's say you one time million dollars, and
7:41
Speaker 1: we'll get into how that trickles down to almost nothing
7:44
Speaker 1: by the time it gets into your pocket. But um,
7:47
Speaker 1: let's say you won ten million dollars and after a
7:49
Speaker 1: couple of years you've blown through it, right, Yeah, You've
7:52
Speaker 1: done nothing to earn that money, so therefore you could
7:55
Speaker 1: never get it back. It was just blind luck. If
7:57
Speaker 1: you make ten million dollars writing a book or writing
8:00
Speaker 1: a movie, or in business or in real estate, you
8:03
Speaker 1: can make that back again. Actually if you if you
8:05
Speaker 1: blow it all right, because you've done something for it,
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Speaker 1: You've used your own um wits and in skill, but
8:12
Speaker 1: with a lot of know it's just a trip to
8:16
Speaker 1: easy Street that turns out to be hell well, that's
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Speaker 1: why it appeals to so many people, except for the
8:20
Speaker 1: hell part. Yeah, you know, and that's why it's people
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Speaker 1: see it as attacks on the poor because it's like here,
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Speaker 1: even the scratch off tickets, you know, just a chance
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Speaker 1: to win like a couple of hundred bucks. It's kind
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Speaker 1: of sad. At the same time, though, you have to
8:35
Speaker 1: you have to add a little perspective to it. You
8:37
Speaker 1: and I don't really play the louder. Like I said,
8:38
Speaker 1: I've done some like scratch off benders here there, but
8:40
Speaker 1: nothing more than like five or ten bucks. Right, I've
8:43
Speaker 1: got an occasional powerball, occasional power I'll admit that, um,
8:47
Speaker 1: but rarely. But consider this. You and I are um,
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Speaker 1: upper middle class white guys age eighteen to forty nine.
8:56
Speaker 1: Pretty much the entire country is based on whatever we want.
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Speaker 1: All of the focus groups, all the studies, all of
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Speaker 1: the the pharmaceutical tests, they're based on us, right, Like,
9:07
Speaker 1: we have it so ridiculously easy that I think it's
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Speaker 1: entirely possible that we're blinded to why people play the lottery.
9:14
Speaker 1: If you simply don't have a leg up, if there's
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Speaker 1: nothing you can do, if you're being kept down economically, socially,
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Speaker 1: or whatever. Um, there is this promise of I could
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Speaker 1: really use a couple extra million bucks, and I don't
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Speaker 1: care if some jackass does come out of the wood
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Speaker 1: work and says he's my uncle. Like, I think it's
9:32
Speaker 1: easy to criticize people who play the lottery as stupid, right,
9:36
Speaker 1: But at the same time, I think that reveals a
9:39
Speaker 1: misunderstanding of where somebody's coming from. And then, of course
9:43
Speaker 1: there are just some jackasses who play the lottery because
9:45
Speaker 1: they're bored or just have or people who do have
9:48
Speaker 1: a gambling problem. But I think that there is some
9:52
Speaker 1: promise of a lottery, and I think that the state
9:57
Speaker 1: praise upon that through their lotteries. Yeah, I mean, it's
10:01
Speaker 1: easy for us to sit here and say, well, if
10:02
Speaker 1: you spend a year on scratch off tickets, if you
10:05
Speaker 1: had invested that in the rath I ra a, then
10:08
Speaker 1: you could potentially have a retirement account. And it's just
10:12
Speaker 1: just shut up. Yeah, I've been poor man, and I
10:14
Speaker 1: can tell you the poor mentality is tough to break
10:16
Speaker 1: out of. Yes, I was. I was poor at one
10:18
Speaker 1: point myself. Yeah, it sucks. And I was a lottery
10:21
Speaker 1: scratch off fiend. Not true. Yeah, So all right, dude,
10:26
Speaker 1: we really usually our tirades come towards the end. For
10:29
Speaker 1: some reason, we front loaded this one with let's talk
10:32
Speaker 1: about how lotteries work. Yes, Josh, if you are playing
10:36
Speaker 1: a game with fifty balls, let's say fifty ping pong balls,
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Speaker 1: and each one that says the number your odds of
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Speaker 1: winning is about sixteen million to one, and if they
10:47
Speaker 1: just add one ball to that soft balls, it shoots
10:52
Speaker 1: up to about seventy six million to one. And the
10:55
Speaker 1: real reason I don't play that is a fantastic calculation.
11:00
Speaker 1: And you just did there. But and I don't mean
11:02
Speaker 1: to criticize you, a surprisingly simple one, actually, right, So,
11:06
Speaker 1: if you have six numbers that you have to pick
11:08
Speaker 1: out of fifty balls, your initial chance is uh fifty
11:11
Speaker 1: to six or it's like I think at eight point
11:14
Speaker 1: three to one, right, and you can go on down
11:17
Speaker 1: the line. After one ball is picked, do you have
11:18
Speaker 1: a forty nine to five chance? And so on and
11:20
Speaker 1: so on. So if you take you to these and
11:22
Speaker 1: multiply them, that's where you get that sixteen million to
11:25
Speaker 1: one chance. Because they don't play lotteries with one ball
11:28
Speaker 1: if they If they did, then what would that be
11:31
Speaker 1: a one to one chance? Especially if it was just
11:34
Speaker 1: one number and they told you at a time the
11:36
Speaker 1: winning numbers is going to be six lottery? Um? So
11:41
Speaker 1: the yeah, you've also got power balls, right, which is
11:43
Speaker 1: are multi state lotteries where everybody joins together. Um. And
11:47
Speaker 1: the most common one is you have to pick five
11:50
Speaker 1: numbers from a set of fifty balls. So use that
11:52
Speaker 1: calculation I just said, Um, But then you also have
11:55
Speaker 1: to pick one powerball number out of thirty six. Then
12:00
Speaker 1: you multiply that original calculation by thirty six, and you're
12:04
Speaker 1: up to seventies six point to seven, five million to one. Chance. Yeah,
12:08
Speaker 1: And like I said, that's why I don't play the
12:10
Speaker 1: lottery for real. I just I would never ever, ever
12:13
Speaker 1: win it, so I'd rather spend that dollar on whatever, cigarettes, beef,
12:17
Speaker 1: jerky anything. Yeah, chuck, Josh, have you ever noticed that, UM,
12:24
Speaker 1: when you say win ten million dollars, what you actually
12:29
Speaker 1: end up with is like two point five million? Just
12:33
Speaker 1: tick y'all. Yeah, well, it depends you're talking about. UM.
12:37
Speaker 1: You can eat. You can choose either lumps on payment
12:40
Speaker 1: or pay me out over the next whatever twenty five years.
12:43
Speaker 1: I think it usually is. Yeah, it looks like from
12:46
Speaker 1: from this article the best one to go with if
12:48
Speaker 1: your patient is the UM series of annual payments or annuity.
12:53
Speaker 1: I disagree. Okay, Well, I mean I would think you
12:56
Speaker 1: could make you get about a five pc interest return
13:00
Speaker 1: that way, and I think if you have half a brain,
13:02
Speaker 1: you can get a better return than that by investing
13:04
Speaker 1: that money. And also I think if you die, doesn't
13:07
Speaker 1: that it's not like they start paying your next of
13:10
Speaker 1: ken or anything, right, No, they do everywhere. Oh yeah,
13:12
Speaker 1: it's been a lot of windfall. Becomes part of your estate. Okay.
13:18
Speaker 1: And actually, since you bring that up, there's a little
13:21
Speaker 1: bit of advice. If you ever do win a major
13:23
Speaker 1: lottery or any a lotto. Uh, the first thing you
13:27
Speaker 1: want to do is sign the ticket because it's a
13:29
Speaker 1: bearer instrument and whoever has it he turns it in
13:32
Speaker 1: is the winner. So you want to sign it. Uh.
13:34
Speaker 1: The next thing you want to do is go talk
13:36
Speaker 1: to a lawyer before you go into turn in your ticket.
13:40
Speaker 1: Go get a lawyer. Yeah, you don't want to be
13:42
Speaker 1: standing on the stage with the big check without having
13:44
Speaker 1: like an accountant and a lawyer by your side, right,
13:47
Speaker 1: And the lawyer is gonna set set up a trust
13:50
Speaker 1: in a state all sorts of other stuff, and then
13:53
Speaker 1: you go in and you claim your winnings and the
13:55
Speaker 1: lawyer is gonna take a chunk. The lawyer is gonna
13:57
Speaker 1: take a chunk, but not as much as Uncle Sam. Huh. Yeah,
14:00
Speaker 1: well that's just the case with everything. Uh. Of course,
14:03
Speaker 1: Uncle Sam's gonna take a time about twenty percent in
14:07
Speaker 1: federal taxes unless you win millions of dollars, and it's
14:10
Speaker 1: gonna shoot up to thirty nine percent, which is the
14:12
Speaker 1: highest tax bracket, and then add state and locals and
14:16
Speaker 1: you'll get about half of your money. And then if
14:19
Speaker 1: you choose a lumps some you get less anyway, So,
14:21
Speaker 1: like you said, a ten million dollar lumps on payment
14:23
Speaker 1: after taxes would be about two and a half a MILLI.
14:27
Speaker 1: But you're done. That's the way I would want to
14:29
Speaker 1: do it. You are done with the annuitized payments, right
14:34
Speaker 1: you you're basically getting uh you start I think at
14:38
Speaker 1: what one percent? Yeah, and it goes up a little
14:41
Speaker 1: bit each each goes up a tenth of a percent
14:43
Speaker 1: each year. So you start off if you win ten
14:46
Speaker 1: million bucks, you start off with two fifty k, and
14:48
Speaker 1: then the last payment turns out to be five K,
14:52
Speaker 1: and you get this check every year. UM. And the
14:56
Speaker 1: way that this is paid for there's the lottery is
14:59
Speaker 1: not just like we're sitting on this pile of cash.
15:01
Speaker 1: They couldn't do that. And what they do actually is
15:04
Speaker 1: they deal with UM bond agents, bond brokers, and they
15:07
Speaker 1: buy zero coupon bonds. Right, so like you have a
15:11
Speaker 1: set price that you're paying for him that day, and
15:14
Speaker 1: in one year or ten years or whatever, this thing
15:17
Speaker 1: is going to be worth a specified amount of money. Right,
15:21
Speaker 1: So like in ten years, if you bought a two
15:23
Speaker 1: d and sixty dollar bond I'm sorry, twenty five years,
15:26
Speaker 1: that would be about a thousand dollars. That's how that works,
15:28
Speaker 1: and what what the lotto does is they contact about
15:31
Speaker 1: usually seven bond dealers to find out who has the
15:34
Speaker 1: best rates, and they um, they purchase a package of
15:39
Speaker 1: twenty five bonds to cover your payout right, and then
15:44
Speaker 1: once the bond matures, they get the money, they transfer
15:46
Speaker 1: it to you and you get a check done done.
15:49
Speaker 1: Pretty interesting and that usually ends up costing them this
15:52
Speaker 1: package of bonds about half of the jackpot, which is
15:55
Speaker 1: about what you get when you get a lump sum.
15:57
Speaker 1: So it doesn't really matter to them either way. Yeah,
16:00
Speaker 1: thin they said about the people choose the lumps some
16:02
Speaker 1: I can. I'm not surprised by that at all. Yeah.
16:04
Speaker 1: And Georgia, actually, I know there's other states too, has
16:07
Speaker 1: one of those win for life deals where there is
16:10
Speaker 1: no lumps on. You get like fifty dollars a year
16:13
Speaker 1: for thirty years or something like that, and that's the prize.
16:16
Speaker 1: There's no like wiggle room and how you accept it. Yeah,
16:18
Speaker 1: other states give you a choice. No, no, No No, win
16:21
Speaker 1: for life is a specific game. Oh it is, okay, Yeah,
16:24
Speaker 1: so like if you play win for life, that that's
16:26
Speaker 1: your prize. Well, some states don't give you a choice.
16:28
Speaker 1: They're like we give out lump sum or we give
16:30
Speaker 1: out a new attize or you can choose, but when
16:32
Speaker 1: you choose, you have to choose when you buy the
16:34
Speaker 1: lotto ticket. Yeah. I think New York you got to
16:35
Speaker 1: choose when you buy it, but most other states is
16:39
Speaker 1: like once you've won it, they let you choose. Pretty cool. Yeah, um, chuck,
16:44
Speaker 1: did you know that there's two types of lotto machines?
16:48
Speaker 1: I do now, Yeah, I didn't before. Yeah. I think
16:51
Speaker 1: all I've ever seen as the air mixed machines. Same here.
16:54
Speaker 1: I think that's what they use on Channel two Action News.
16:57
Speaker 1: I know that dude, by the way, do you what's
16:58
Speaker 1: his name, John Crow? He's an old old friend of
17:00
Speaker 1: mine from TV production and he was picked as the
17:03
Speaker 1: lottery lottery guy and it looks really good and dress
17:07
Speaker 1: uh you mean dressed up. Yeah. Yeah, he's a nice guy. Yeah.
17:12
Speaker 1: And he's a nice guy using air mix machine. Right,
17:16
Speaker 1: And that is the one where you see the ping
17:19
Speaker 1: pong balls floating around and the air it's yeah. And
17:22
Speaker 1: then they opened the little door and one at a time,
17:25
Speaker 1: the little ping pong ball slides up the shoot always visible.
17:29
Speaker 1: That's key. You can never have a ping pong ball
17:32
Speaker 1: go through a tube that you can't see through. That's
17:35
Speaker 1: bad news is it doesn't inspire confidence. And you'll also
17:38
Speaker 1: notice that all lot of drawings are live, which is
17:42
Speaker 1: kind of a big thing too, very important. I mean,
17:45
Speaker 1: you suspect they're live. I guess if you don't believe
17:47
Speaker 1: that the moon landing was real, you probably aren't buying
17:50
Speaker 1: that the lot of drawings are live. Yeah, we should
17:53
Speaker 1: mention a couple of other security measures. Um and or again.
17:57
Speaker 1: It's actually overseen by the state police and the detect
18:00
Speaker 1: the attends each drawing. I thought that was pretty cool.
18:03
Speaker 1: Balls are usually weighed ahead of time. Why before and after?
18:07
Speaker 1: Why are we gonna talk about Pennsylvania? Let's do it
18:09
Speaker 1: all right? The trimple six fix is what it's called.
18:15
Speaker 1: John Travolta in nineteen eighty John Travolta was it a movie?
18:19
Speaker 1: I can't remember. I think it was What You Got
18:22
Speaker 1: to Do with It? Then he was in a movie
18:23
Speaker 1: about it, Okay, but I think it was loosely based
18:25
Speaker 1: on the I don't think it was like a depiction
18:27
Speaker 1: of that. Yeah. Famously, in nineteen eighty, the Pennsylvania lottery
18:31
Speaker 1: was rigged by a masterminded not well because he got
18:35
Speaker 1: caught by a guy named Nick Perry, he was the
18:38
Speaker 1: John Crow of Pennsylvania at the time. He was the announcer,
18:43
Speaker 1: and he got together with an art director and said, hey, dude,
18:45
Speaker 1: can you figure out a way to wait these balls
18:48
Speaker 1: except for three of them, I'm sorry, two of them
18:51
Speaker 1: four and six, And that way we know that only
18:54
Speaker 1: combinations of four six will come up. And I think
18:56
Speaker 1: there's eight combinations and a triple digit drawing. And they
19:01
Speaker 1: did it, but they, you know, they got greedy and
19:04
Speaker 1: got caught. Was the art director named Phoebe Buffet, No
19:08
Speaker 1: she in the Trivalta movie. His name was Joseph Buck
19:12
Speaker 1: and he was pinched along with Perry and then some
19:15
Speaker 1: other people they had in on the scan that lingo.
19:19
Speaker 1: They basically they ended up that the cops were alerted
19:22
Speaker 1: to the fact that there was a very skewed amount
19:25
Speaker 1: of numbers bought for six and four and when it
19:28
Speaker 1: came up six six six, and they had all these
19:30
Speaker 1: people clamoring for winnings, they went, we should look into this.
19:33
Speaker 1: I think that just the fact that it came up
19:35
Speaker 1: six six six alone should raised a few eyebrows, right,
19:38
Speaker 1: that's the number of the beast josh Uh and so
19:42
Speaker 1: he you know, they were. They were tried and convicted,
19:44
Speaker 1: and Perry I think some of the other guys sold
19:46
Speaker 1: him out and he went to jail just for a
19:50
Speaker 1: couple of years, then the Halfway house, and then he
19:52
Speaker 1: was on probation. So not a very big deal for him.
19:56
Speaker 1: I guess did he get to keep the money? No, No,
19:58
Speaker 1: they got all that back. Okay, So yeah, they're using
20:02
Speaker 1: an air mixed machine, and since then, air mixed machines
20:06
Speaker 1: are still used. Obviously they use them. Your buddy uses
20:09
Speaker 1: it on the news. Um, but machine, Oh it isn't okay. Uh,
20:14
Speaker 1: he doesn't take it home and polish it at night
20:16
Speaker 1: before bed. No, but we could get a scam together
20:18
Speaker 1: with him. We should try it. Oh. Anyway, The other
20:26
Speaker 1: type of lotto machine that's generally used that's viewed as
20:29
Speaker 1: more secure, largely because of that scam, uh, is the
20:33
Speaker 1: gravity pick lotto machine. Right. How does that thing work? Well?
20:37
Speaker 1: It uses like kind of rubbery balls that are heavy
20:40
Speaker 1: with two paddles that spinning opposite directions that mix the balls. Right,
20:44
Speaker 1: there's no air involved, there's no ping pong balls, there's
20:47
Speaker 1: no waiting the balls, and other than that, it's virtually
20:50
Speaker 1: the same thing as an an air pick ball. This
20:53
Speaker 1: is an optical sensor, so it's high tech. And then bam,
20:56
Speaker 1: six numbers, one after the other, and if you want,
21:00
Speaker 1: if you pick them you want. I imagine, like I said,
21:03
Speaker 1: I don't play, I don't even want to win, but
21:05
Speaker 1: I imagine that's a very surreal moment when you look
21:09
Speaker 1: down at your ticket, because there's all those numbers. It
21:11
Speaker 1: would just I bet it's really difficult for your brain
21:13
Speaker 1: to really see that and except that that's what it's seeing. Yeah,
21:19
Speaker 1: we used to when I worked at in New Jersey
21:21
Speaker 1: at the restaurant, we used to pull That's really the
21:23
Speaker 1: only time I ever played that much. We'd pull our money,
21:25
Speaker 1: the waiters would, and we'd buy like a hundred tickets.
21:27
Speaker 1: You know, you're throwing five dollars and I'll agree to
21:29
Speaker 1: split it and you know, buy the restaurant and burn
21:31
Speaker 1: it down if we want that kind of thing. Was Kelly,
21:35
Speaker 1: uh No, no, No No, this is a New Jersey at
21:36
Speaker 1: the store. Did Yeah, that's it. Well, if you want
21:41
Speaker 1: to read about lottos, and we also have an article
21:45
Speaker 1: called how to Play the Lottery, Tips and Guidelines, it's
21:47
Speaker 1: pretty in depth, didn't it. I didn't read that one.
21:49
Speaker 1: Did you really in depth? Other tips? Yeah? What what
21:54
Speaker 1: kind of tips could there be? Well, there's like wheeling tracking,
21:57
Speaker 1: like basically paying attention to numbers. How different people doing
22:00
Speaker 1: pooling is is one thing. How many members there should
22:04
Speaker 1: be in a pool if it's a private pool, and
22:06
Speaker 1: then more than fifteen. If it's a largely commercial pool,
22:09
Speaker 1: no more than a hundred. Make sure that you're the
22:12
Speaker 1: people who are organizing it are reputable, etcetera, etcetera. I
22:15
Speaker 1: bet that could get messy. Look at these spreadsheets. Yeah. So,
22:19
Speaker 1: if you are interested in playing the lotto and you
22:22
Speaker 1: want some tips and tricks, we won't judge. You know,
22:24
Speaker 1: you can type in lotteries on how stuff Works dot
22:27
Speaker 1: Com in the handy search bar, and there you will
22:30
Speaker 1: also find, in my experience, the first time I've ever
22:34
Speaker 1: seen the phrase hotter than a two dollar pistol used
22:37
Speaker 1: in an article on the site. You'll find that by
22:40
Speaker 1: typing lottery in the handy search bar how stuffworks dot Com,
22:44
Speaker 1: which brings us, of course, to listener mail this indeed,
22:49
Speaker 1: herr Clark, Uh, this is I'm just gonna call this UM.
22:53
Speaker 1: I can't believe this happened. Email. This is from Ben
22:57
Speaker 1: and Megan, and they said this. My wife and I
23:00
Speaker 1: married in Las Vegas recently and one of those amazing
23:02
Speaker 1: Las Vegas chapels. It wasn't a tequila inspired spur of
23:06
Speaker 1: the moment sort of thing. We planned it for several
23:08
Speaker 1: months and you guys actually played a part in our evening.
23:11
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you remember this one. I can't believe this.
23:14
Speaker 1: Uh to explain, before we left, I had crafted a
23:17
Speaker 1: perfect wedding night playlist of my iPod. I've also added
23:20
Speaker 1: several of your podcast to listen to on the flight.
23:23
Speaker 1: Because he's a big, tall guy and he hates to fly,
23:26
Speaker 1: so apparently we helped that. After the ceremony, What what
23:29
Speaker 1: is he being tall had to do with hating to fly? Well,
23:32
Speaker 1: he says he gets really uncomfortable in the seat in
23:34
Speaker 1: our podcast forget, So he's not afraid of flying because
23:37
Speaker 1: he's taller, and I'm just grant. So after the ceremony
23:41
Speaker 1: and dinner, we retreated to our lux sweet in the
23:43
Speaker 1: Trump Hotel, ordered a bottle of champa, queued up the
23:47
Speaker 1: playlist on my iPod, and plugged into the room stereo
23:50
Speaker 1: and slipped into the inn room. JACUZI first up Al Green,
23:56
Speaker 1: then Solomon Burke, Cat Power, Elvis Costello, and then Chosh
24:01
Speaker 1: and Chuck introducing the Stuff you Should Know podcasts. It's
24:04
Speaker 1: not any worse than Cat Power, that's true. I hadn't
24:07
Speaker 1: realized the shuffle feature would shuffle everything on the iPod,
24:10
Speaker 1: not only the songs. Just in case you're wondering, we
24:13
Speaker 1: actually let it play. And that's a story of how
24:15
Speaker 1: you two took part in our wedding night. I believe
24:18
Speaker 1: that makes us your official Stuff you Should Know podcast
24:20
Speaker 1: newlyweds ps. Was it good for you? That's awesome. The
24:26
Speaker 1: only way that story could be better is if they
24:27
Speaker 1: conceived during one of our podcasts and it was the
24:31
Speaker 1: show on like Lobotomies. Yeah, in Utah, we'd have legal
24:35
Speaker 1: claim on that. Baby. If you have an awesome wedding
24:40
Speaker 1: nights story, now, actually, you guys just keep that to yourself. Ag. Yeah.
24:44
Speaker 1: If you have a story about winning the lottery and
24:47
Speaker 1: how it either uplifted your life, ruined your life, or
24:51
Speaker 1: made you cognizant of the phrase hotter than a two
24:53
Speaker 1: dollar pistol, put in an email and send it to
24:57
Speaker 1: Stuffed podcast at how Stuff Works dot on for more
25:04
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25:07
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25:13
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