Buying and scratching instant lottery tickets is a thing that almost everyone has done at one time or another. For some folks it’s probably something they do all too often. I guess for me, the bad buying habit is junk food. EASILY had spent my extra money on instant lottery tickets over time, I may have already been rich by now rather than overweight. Like anything, be it food or gambling one must do it in moderation, which is often not easy to accomplish.
Here in hawaii of Pennsylvania where I live, the first scratch off ticket came out in 1975, and they have been a large hit every since.
I’ve bought instant lottery tickets of each available price range in my state. I usually choose the $1 – $2 tickets, but from time to time I buy 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, in order that was like throwing away my $20. You would believe with having to spend that much money, they would give everyone at least a FREE $1 ticket or something. I thought afterwards that I was sort of foolish for spending and losing the $20 using one ticket, but heck as the saying goes, “If you don’t play, you can’t win !”, it was a gamble, and I didn’t win that time. I have known two individuals who each won near $20,000 on instant lottery tickets. THEREFORE I can say for sure, “yes, some folks do win it big.”
Unlike the live lottery that’s usually drawn by picking numbers, the moment lottery is pre-determined months before it’s release. The tickets were created and printed, they are distributed to the lottery retailers through the entire state. Most small convenience stores offer instant lottery tickets, in addition to the large chain stores. It is possible to usually see them in a vending machine with multiple styles and price ranges to choose from, or they’re at the cashiers area on the counter or behind a shielded section. Instant lottery tickets sell for only $1 so when high as $20 each in most states of the U.S. but some states may have tickets that sell for a lot more than $20 each.
Situstoto do instant lotteries to greatly help fund many different programs. For instance in Pennsylvania, the lottery is used to create funds to benefit programs for the Commonwealth’s older residents. In Ohio, since 1974, the Lottery has provided more than $13 billion to public education. Annually, the lottery provides about 4.5 percent of the funding needed for Ohio’s public education. In Missouri, approximately 27.3 cents of every dollar allocated to the Lottery benefits education programs; 61.6 cents dates back to players as prizes, 5 cents can be used for administrative costs and 6.1 cents goes to retailers by means of commissions, incentives and bonuses. In every, more than 93 cents of each dollar stays in Missouri. It’s different for each state, but the lottery is very beneficial regardless of the few problems it can cause to some, by means of gambling addictions.
Most folks buy instant (scratch off) tickets, and when they don’t really win anything, they throw the tickets in the trash. Did you know that each time you throw a losing instant lottery ticket in the trash, you’re throwing money away ? Yes, you can find literally hundreds if not a large number of folks around the world that would love to buy your tickets from you. I’ve seen losing lottery tickets sell for as high as $15 each, they were tickets that had no redeemable value. I once visited a local convenience store and asked them if I may have a bag of losing instant lottery tickets I saw they had on the floor behind the counter. The clerk gladly gave them if you ask me, I took the tickets home and after checking through all of them, I found two that were $1 winners which were not redeemed, and I sold the rest of the losing tickets for $30, and the store was just likely to throw them away.
Where did I sell them ? On eBay. I happened to look 1 day and I noticed there was losing instant lottery tickets for sale on the eBay auction website. You can find folks selling non-winning, so called ‘worthless’ lottery tickets on eBay all the time. I just did a search now while writing this short article, and I came across over 100 different auction listings for them. Who buys these non-winning lottery tickets ? Collectors.
Instant Lottery Ticket collecting is fast becoming a big thing. There are groups and individuals all around the world, that love collecting lottery tickets. There are many websites, discussion groups and forums now simply for lottery ticket collecting. Actually there is a good new term or name for an instant lottery ticket collector: LOTOLOGIST, and the instant lottery ticket collecting hobby is named: LOTOLOGY. To observe how big this hobby is now just visit your favorite internet search engine, such as GOOGLE, and do a seek out: lotologist OR lotology. And you may find many sites collecting, selling and buying used non-winning instant lottery tickets.
About the Author
