Buying and scratching instant lottery tickets is something 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 processed foods. If I had spent my extra cash on instant lottery tickets through the years, 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 do.
Here in Data HK of Pennsylvania where I live, the first scratch off ticket arrived in 1975, and they have been a large hit every since.
I have bought instant lottery tickets of each available price range in my own state. I usually buy the $1 – $2 tickets, but once in awhile I purchase a $5 – $10 ticket, and something time, I purchased a $20 instant ticket. I won nothing on the $20 ticket, not $1 or a FREE ticket, in order that was like throwing out my $20. You would believe that with needing 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 on one ticket, but heck as they say, “If you don’t play, you can’t win !”, it had been a gamble, and I didn’t win that time. I have known two individuals who each won near $20,000 on instant lottery tickets. So I can say for sure, “yes, some people do win it big.”
Unlike the live lottery that’s usually drawn by picking numbers, the instant lottery is pre-determined months before it’s release. The tickets are designed and printed, then they are distributed to the lottery retailers through the entire state. Most small convenience stores offer instant lottery tickets, as well as 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 are 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 even more than $20 each.
States do instant lotteries to greatly help fund many different programs. For example in Pennsylvania, the lottery is used to generate 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 each 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 in the form of commissions, incentives and bonuses. In all, more than 93 cents of each dollar stays in Missouri. It’s different for each state, but the lottery is quite beneficial regardless of the few problems it could 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 purchase your tickets from you. I’ve seen losing lottery tickets sell for as high as $15 each, these were tickets that had no redeemable value. I once went to an area convenience store and asked them easily could have a bag of losing instant lottery tickets I saw that 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 them all, I found two which were $1 winners which were not redeemed, and I sold the remaining losing tickets for $30, and the store was just going to throw them away.
Where did I sell them ? On eBay. I happened to check 1 day and I noticed there was losing instant lottery tickets on the market on the eBay auction website. You can find folks selling non-winning, so called ‘worthless’ lottery tickets on eBay all the time. I simply did a search now while writing this article, 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. You can find groups and individuals all around the world, that love collecting lottery tickets. There are plenty of websites, discussion groups and forums now just for lottery ticket collecting. Actually there is even a new term or name for an instant lottery ticket collector: LOTOLOGIST, and the moment lottery ticket collecting hobby is named: LOTOLOGY. To see how big this hobby is becoming just visit your favorite search engine, such as GOOGLE, and do a seek out: lotologist OR lotology. And you could find many sites collecting, buying and selling used non-winning instant lottery tickets.