Here's the painful truth: betting is for fools!
By MUNGAI KIHANYA
The Sunday Nation
Nairobi,
03 July 2016
Like all get-rich-quick schemes, betting is for fools! Before you call
your lawyer to sue me, let me explain. A standard deck of cards has 52
unique cards. I pull out 2 of them and ask you to give me Sh50 for a
chance to guess what they are. If you get the right answer, I will
double your money; that is, I will pay you Sh100. Would you agree? Only
a fool would!
This is the kind of deal being offered in the Lotto lottery. You pay
Sh50 and chose any six unique numbers from 1 to 49. They run a random
draw and, if your choices match their outcome, you win Sh10,000,000;
yes, ten million shillings!
Now this is not new in Kenya. A similar lottery was here in the
mid-2000s. Do you remember Loto 6/49? That time, the prize money was Sh5
million. I wrote about it in these columns in February 2005 and analysed
the numbers. It turned out that the chance of winning is one in
13,983,816; yes, one in 14 million!
The one thing that people (including those at the Betting Control and
Licensing Board) don’t ever fully appreciate about betting is that, for
you to win, many other bettors must lose. It is a zero-sum game. It adds
absolutely nothing valuable to humanity. Unlike other “normal”
businesses, betting companies take out more than they put in!
Other businesses add value to humanity. You pay, say, Sh50 to a
telephone company and in return you use their network to talk to a
person a great distance away. The company gains Sh50 and you save travel
costs and time. Everyone goes home happy.
In the Lotto lottery; millions of people go home crying after losing and
only two celebrate – the winner and the owner of the betting company.
Now; since each ticket costs Sh50, and 13,983,815 did NOT win, their
combined total loss comes to Sh50 x 13,983,815 = Sh699,190,750. Out of
this, the winner is given Sh10,000,000 leaving Sh689,190,750 for the
betting company. Like I said: the house always wins!
The people who pay the Sh689,190,750 get nothing in return. No product.
No service. Just an adrenaline rush when the draw is being done and
tears when they realise that they lost. This is why I insist that
betting is for fools!
***
Many readers have written in trying to convince me that there will be a
general election in 2022. All of them are talking about “a five-year
term”. In each case, I replied with three questions: First: which clause
of the constitution talks about five years? Second; if 2013 + 5 = 2018,
why then are we holding elections in 2017 instead of 2018? Third; why is
the year 2022 in the 21st century yet it starts with the
number 20?
The answers to those questions lead to only one conclusion: the general
election will be in 2021; not 2022.
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