Obviously, we all know how difficult it is to win the Mega Millions or the PowerBall grand prize. If it were easy, we’d have all won it by now.
I know from speaking with regular lottery players that constantly playing the lottery and winning nothing can be disheartening over time. Even winning the smallest prize on the Powerball ($4.00) happens very infrequently, especially if you play the same numbers every week.
This low chance of winning is what drives some people to try the lottery scratch-off, instant-win games.
So the question you may ask:
Do I have a better chance of winning with a scratch-off ticket than I do with the bigger lottery drawings?
The simple answer is “yes.” But don’t confuse better chances of winning with a “guarantee” that you are going to win with scratch-off tickets.
The odds of winning the grand prize in a PowerBall drawing are roughly 1 in 300,000,000. Yes, it’s ridiculously high I know. But people do win it, so we all keep playing. If you bought a scratch-off ticket the odds are about 1 in 1,000,000.
NOTE: This is just a very loose and general comparison. There is a lot of mathematics involved with calculating odds. Particularly when dealing with different types of scratch-off games at different price points and in different regions of the country.
Scratch-off games come at different price points and offer different top prizes, as well as different smaller prizes. Scratch-off games can cost as high as $50 for one ticket nowadays.
Why would somebody pay $50 for one scratch-off ticket? If you can afford to spend $50 on one ticket, why even bother playing the lottery?
The reason has to do with the odds of winning.
Although the odds of winning the grand prize on a scratch-off ticket aren’t much better than winning the grand prize in the PowerBall drawing, the odds of winning “SOMETHING” are much higher.
The manufacturer has to compensate for the higher ticket price by allowing a higher percentage of players to win “SOMETHING.” I have a better chance of winning $5.00 on a $5.00 scratch-off ticket than I do of winning the $4.00 on a $2.00 Powerball ticket.
You spend $50 and you may win your $50 back. I’ve been in the store behind individuals who won $500 on a scratch-off ticket. I had a store clerk tell me that she was nearly out of money because 3 people had won $500 on scratch-off tickets that day.
And we’ve all seen that person who hangs out at the store counter buying scratch-off tickets, scratching them off, and returning to the counter with winning tickets to exchange them for still more scratch-off tickets.
Scratch-off tickets tend to award lesser prizes with more frequency, even if the prize is just getting your money back.
Each scratch-off card is supposed to have the odds of winning at every prize level printed on the back of the card. If you check the odds of winning the lower prizes on your preferred scratch-off, you may possibly be able to increase your chances of winning on that type of card.
Buying scratch-offs in bulk, especially the cheaper ones should increase your chances of winning “something.” This is not according to me. This is according to people who fancy themselves as experts when it comes to playing scratch-offs.
Buying multiple cards from the same roll of cards is also a tactic these people recommend. Again, I want to reiterate that these are not tactics that are going to win you the grand prize. These are suggestions these folks say may help you to win “something.”
And again, these are NOT guarantees!!!! You may increase your odds. That’s all. I’ve also seem people buy 5-10 scratch-offs and didn’t win a dern thing! At the end of the day this is still a game of chance.
The fact is that a certain percentage of all scratch-offs sold will need to contain winning tickets. The manufacturer needs to supply a subset of winning tickets based on the odds printed on the tickets. Otherwise, the games are fraudulent.
If you suffer from the demoralizing repetitiveness of getting nothing back from the Mega Millions or the PowerBall, see what the scratch-off tickets can do for you. Heck, I very rarely play scratch-offs and even I’ve won “something.” But don’t play if you can’t afford it. Scratch-offs can be addictive. If you play, play responsibly.