Lottery Pools at Work

[FFR]

Who participates in them? Who thinks they are stupid?

The reason I ask is that our office had long time held the policy that we would only play the lottery on big pots and we would all put in our $2 on a once in a while basis. I thought it worked well. If you didn't get your $2 to the organizer on time, you were out.

Now they have decided, without prior discussion, that the best way to do lotteries now is to have everyone put $20 in a pot at the end of every month and play every single lottery. While $20 isn't a lot of money, it's still $240/year which could be used on a number of things. However, there's always that pressure to participate because it's a "team" thing and if you don't and then they actually win, you're the loser with no money.

What are people's thoughts on these?

[KTrain]

I'd probably pay the $20 a month. I would not want to be the loser that was left behind to do everyone's job after they've quit.. Then again, the chances of winning are next to none.

[csnarpy]

my wife is in her company pool, when she took maternity leave she was not going to continue while she was away. I quickly said "what are you nuts?" and paid for her year's worth of lotto pool.

I really don't want to be left out to dry when she quits and they win.

[red sky]

Tell that to the 14th ATB employee who opted out*

*Hypothetically speaking

[troutman]

Use an agreement like this:

http://www.wclc.com/download/wclc/gba2007.pdf

[troutman]

You are helping Alberta charities.

[ken0042]

Originally Posted by troutman

Use an agreement like this:

http://www.wclc.com/download/wclc/gba2007.pdf

Spoken like a lawyer.

The problem with that form is you have to identify the tickets for each draw; which defeats the whole "get $20 from everybody once a month so you don't have to track them down" plan.

We made up our own agreement before; the main thing being to make sure that there is something in writing in place. And if anybody ever leaves, make them sign something indicating they are done.

[troutman]

Originally Posted by ken0042

Spoken like a lawyer.

The problem with that form is you have to identify the tickets for each draw; which defeats the whole "get $20 from everybody once a month so you don't have to track them down" plan.

We made up our own agreement before; the main thing being to make sure that there is something in writing in place. And if anybody ever leaves, make them sign something indicating they are done.

Yes, we just modified it a bit to make it on-going.

[fredr123]

I believe people at one of my old offices won a few hundred grand 15-20 years ago. Because of that, they continued to be loyal lottery players at least until I left. I refused to participate most of the time, choosing to purchase an extra coffee or two every week rather than play. However remote the chances though, I would be steamed had I missed out on the pot everyone else shared back in the day.

[Swarly]

you are better off taking that 240/year and putting it in your retirement fund. $240/year over 40 years of working... $9600, but with interest you can have anywhere from 35-100k depending on your % return.

[Frank the Tank]

I do not participate in our office pool out of pure greed. I buy my own tickets cause if the pot is 12 million, I want 12 million all to myself not split 42 ways or whatever it is here.

[Ice]

Three weeks before my husband started working at his company a group of employees won the lotto. There are four people who normally played who either forgot to pay in, had the day off, went on vacation, etc. You can't even say the word lottery in front of them. Three years later they are still regretting that they are at work while their lotto pool buddies have it made. I only wish my husband started working there three weeks earlier, he would've put in his five bucks!

[Rathji]

The second day after I started my new job there was the $49 million lotto that they collected a pool for, but I declined. 44 people out of my department of ~60 people bought in and I realized that my life would be pure and utter hell if they won. Not only would I be stuck knowing i could have won the money as well, but my job would become unbearable since every single one of those people would quit.

They only play really big pots, so I will probably keep 2 bucks around for it next time.

[4X4]

Originally Posted by Ice

Three weeks before my husband started working at his company a group of employees won the lotto. There are four people who normally played who either forgot to pay in, had the day off, went on vacation, etc. You can't even say the word lottery in front of them. Three years later they are still regretting that they are at work while their lotto pool buddies have it made. I only wish my husband started working there three weeks earlier, he would've put in his five bucks!

But three weeks earlier, there wasn't a job opening.

[FFR]

Well I ended up putting in the $20. Not because I think it's some great investment strategy (which I swear some people at work do) but becuase I typically succumb to peer pressure. I mean $20 isn't that much and I'm still really not totally behind the principle but whatever. It's a "team" thing I suppose. I just don't get totally excited about it like everyone else does.

[jar_e]

I remember at my old work place, one unit was so hardcore about the lottery and offered to others but no one took them up on it.

They were one number off from winning 32 million...ever since then I chipped in...screw that, I'm not going to be the last one working while they're all spending it on hookers and blow.

[SteveToms]

At work, everyone takes turns buying the ticket, all I know is if I bought the winning ticket a few weeks back, I would have disappeared, after all I am a greedy .

[Jason14h]

At work, everyone takes turns buying the ticket, all I know is if I bought the winning ticket a few weeks back, I would have disappeared, after all I am a greedy .

Its hard to disappear when you have to claim it I don't think you'd win the lawsuit either!

[Phanuthier]

I like to do them, but I follow a different thesis.

The chances of winning a 6/49 are something like 1/13,000,000. Unless I've blown a decimal place, winning the 6/49 is around 0.000000005%. if you buy 10 tickets, its 0.00000005%, a difference of 0.00000001%. Thats not a lot of difference. But if you don't enter at all, you have 0% flat out.

So, logically speaking, it would make the most sense to buy 1 ticket, but it doesn't make a lot of sense to buy 10 tickets. While you might get 10x's the chances of winning, the % is still relatively the same; but infinitely better then not buying a ticket. So, back at my last internship, have 4 people chip in $2 per month and the group of 4 buy 1 ticket every week.

[icarus]

A friend of mine's husband won the lottery in a work pool.

It was a couple of years ago and we were in law school together while her fiance was working in Vancouver. His pool at work won the jackpot in the BC lottery which I think was about $23M or something... his share was $3-4M. My friend was always going to be the breadwinner--being a law student at all--but that changed in an instant. He soon learned a new word: prenup. But in any case they are happily married now and my friend was able to go into sole practice shortly after finishing law school.

So there's a positive outcome.