"David Dyer-Bennet" wrote in message ...


I've thought about whether winning is actually any less likely than
their just sending you the check by mistake. But checking news
sources, it seems that people *do* actually win now and then, whereas
there are no documented cases of the check just being sent to the
wrong person.
--

The problem is not that people don't win, the problem is the EV is horrible.
That is, if you played the lottery forever, what would be the overall return
(essentially odds_of_winning*amount_won / amount_to_play). State
lotteries are horrendously bad. EV's around .5. Even the real sucker
casino games are up in the .9's.