there is always a house advantage,,,i get that....But, I lose far more than the house edge percentage and math probabilities...not just a one time thing...this has been going on for several years...
2015-12-22T18:09:29Z
update.....I buy scratchers and lottery tickets but don't even win back 5% .....they say the lottery company pays back half ( 50% ) to winners
2015-12-23T17:55:24Z
davidzero....I don't understand why you referenced me ? why would I ask PDQ....he hasn't increased his bonus points lead in 6 weeks
Cynical_Student2015-12-23T07:15:51Z
Slot Machines/One Armed Bandits work on a system - whereas there has to be a given number of loses, interspersed with a few small wins (to encourage people to continue playing) before there is a big pay out. It's a cycle - usually a long one, but the 'Big Win' is relatively predictable. This is why some gamblers will automatically take your stool when you walk away from the machine - because they've seen you feed money into it - and get nothing back - thus pushing the card further through the 'cycle' and closer to the big win. Of course these machines are also programmed for the 'big win' not to happen by clockwork, sometimes it'll happen earlier - sometimes later - but still, it's a cycle.
As for the Lottery, that's a game of chance - either you're numbers come up or they don't.
The house's edge is really huge if you think how much money players give in all day long. The reason you keep losing is you unluckily happen to be on the other losing side of the whole win-lose percentage. You will eventually win some day, but does that pay you back in the expected value. In order to see that happen, you have to play a long long time... But then, you will already have lost lots of money. Gambling is a game of luck, not a smart investment. However, with a few logic strategies, it will help you manage to win some money but you will need to have a good discipline regarding when to play and when to leave the game.
Ask Pdq. Hahaha j/k, I just figured I'd beat FahQ to it.
The house edge is the average outcome, not what you're literally supposed to lose on each wager. Most of the time it's impossible to literally lose that exact amount. For instance, the house edge in Roulette is about 5% per spin, but you can't lose 5% of a wager. You either win, or you lose 100% of your wager. But in the long run, the amount you'll be down will be the equivalent of having lost 5% per spin.
As for lottery type games, see Zman's answer. The 50% stat is skewed by the miracle outcomes. Most of the time you'll lose more than 50% before some jackpot recovers some of your losses to bring it closer to 50% (but by then it's 50% of a large dollar amount, which is worse than losing 90 or 100% of a small dollar amount). In lottery type games "the long run" is longer.
So right now, I don't doubt that you've averaged a bigger than 50% loss from the scratchers. However, that's to be expected, based on the low probability of the outcomes that bring the average up to 50%.
There are numerous ways to lose; but it often comes down to lack of discipline. A lot of gamblers when winning want to win more and when losing want to win the money back they lost, so they don't stop until they run out of money. Playing when tired often makes gambling a chore; playing when drunk is a double-edged sword and playing borrowed money, or money needed for something else tends to inhibit the player and rarely works out well. There are casino games with poor odds (such as money wheel etc) that should not be played; poor odds bets, such as the centre bets at craps, which should also be avoided; because the percentages catch up in the long term. Scratch cards and the national lottery have very poor odds, as do European slot machines (around 23% to the house); all should be avoided unless you have a self destructive streak. In my experience most players are winning at some point, but they play for too long and have no set objective. If players quit when they doubled their money then casinos would have a harder time, but they have an inbuilt percentage in all table games and the electronic games percentages are, in most cases, even higher. They best way to lose ... just keep playing ...
You say the lottery company pays out 50%. Well that means they keep 50% (good for them, but not for the player) and the jackpot will be a significant part of that 50% prize fund. If the ticket costs $1 and the jackpot is a million; then for every two million tickets sold one ticket is worth a million .... and that equates to 50%. I winning ticket; 1,999,999 losing tickets. The slogan "you've got to be in it to win it" should really read "you've got to be in it to lose it" as that's much more accurate.
So if you want to lose, then play the lottery; scratch cards or the slots and don't stop until you have lost everything. If you want to improve your chances of winning then: know the games you play; adopt a strategy and quit when you reach a target amount, cash in and walk out.
(1) The house advantage is given on a "per play" basis. Almost no only plays once. If you put money into a slot machine you will probably play dozens, or even hundreds, of times before leaving, and the house advantage applies to each time you play. The same is true for table games.
(2) The house advantage is calculated based on all returns, including the few times a very large payout is paid. For example, assume a slot machine that costs a dollar to play pays out $10,000 an average of once every 100,000 spins. If you are lucky an receive that payout all is good, but it is unlikely that you will. Assuming that you do not, ten cents out of every dollar that you wagered went toward those $10,000 payouts, so the house advantage was essentially 10% higher than the advertised return.