What are your real chances of winning the R120-million Powerball?
Could you be the winner or are the chances slim to nothing? That's the gamble!
We cannot say for certain how many people still play the lotto every week and hold on to that pipe dream.
But we assume many still do. There's nothing wrong with having a dream, but looking to achieve that dream by gambling is a gamble in itself...
And just like that "Another Powerball draw has passed with no winner, taking the total rollover to a guaranteed jackpot of R120-million – one of the biggest South African jackpots on record." (Business Tech)
Talking about records is one thing, but many of the people who 'Tata my Chance' do so with the hopes of one day winning big.
But the odds of winning are quite slim. Like, really slim.
"The odds are so slim that you are 20,000 times more likely to be born with an extra toe than you are to win the South African lottery. Yet the idea of spending R5 on a ticket to stand a chance of winning millions – often over R100-million – is extremely enticing, as it offers the dream of a very high reward for a very low risk." (Business Tech)
Even though the odds of winning big with the lottery are so slim, it hasn't stopped people from choosing their numbers weekly and trying their luck.
To explain the odds of winning, Business Tech put things into perspective by saying: "South Africans are 58 times more likely to get struck by lightning than they are to win the standard Lotto jackpot – and 121 times more likely to get struck than winning the Powerball."
Eish, that's putting things less than mildly than we expected. It's like the saying goes, the truth hurts.
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Not knowing is worse because would you rather live in obliviousness or stop, reconfigure the money you are spending on a 'chance' at winning, and invest that money for a tangible return on that investment?
We would opt for the latter.
"The South African lottery comprises 52 balls with a draw of six, putting the number of different possible combinations at 20,358,520 – which is where the 1 in 20,358,520 odds come from." (Business Tech)
In short, as much as we can say, "May the odds forever be in your favour", they probably aren't going to be...
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