Someone once said that a lottery is a "tax on people who are bad at maths" and I couldn't agree more.

Your odds of winning anything are 54 to 1. So for every winning ticket, 53 don't win.

12% of the £1 goes to the tax coffers and as half of the pot goes to those very, very few winners only 28p out of the £1 every reaches a 'Good Cause'. And you have no control over what those good causes are.

The Lottery keeps people playing by the fear of not putting your £1 on when your cherished numbers do eventually turn up.

It is a get-rich-quick scheme only for the promoters and the HMRC.

I could not agree more, it is a tax on the dreamers who are afraid of the reality that the only way to wealth is through hard work. The only thing you missed out was the oft' quoted *** 'you know what happened, I was short of cash this week and I didn't do the lottery, and guess what, all my numbers came up'.

And just think about this; Richard Branson came up with a not-for-profit scheme to run the lottery, and he didn't win the battle with the very-much-for-profit Camelot. And somebody, on another forum, said he didn't do Premium Bonds because he didn't trust them!

I have never 'done' the national lottery, and I never will. I agree that it is a tax on the vulnerable and even most of the 'winners' seem to end up in a mess.

Rant over! :o)

i was saying the same thing about premium bonds so you sure you didnt just read my post luke???

The lottery is hardly a tax luke given that is a choice to play it.

hot picks and thunderball are better games than the actual lotto draw,normally i prefer the scratch cards as i have more luck on them.

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Red - I do believe you are actually insane.

Is the tax on your cigarettes and alcohol not really a tax due to you having a free choice as to whether you smoke or drink?

Maybe it is simply a closing of the circle. As it is generally the poorer popluation that buy scratchcards and lottery tickets, perhaps this is a clever ploy to offset the lack of income tax that HMRC suffers.

Lmao

mooreaz i think YOUR THE ONE WHO IS INSANE

only the mega rich dont play the lotto,most people do/

now as far as im aware the gambling tax got removed years ago so nobody pays any tax on the price of the ticket only the profits camelot makes are subject to tax.

cigs and booze are taxed mainly for health reasons as they have many side effects which is why to CORRECT YOU i will state that i dont smoke and drink very little booze except on special occasions which even then il be lucky to get through a couple of blue wkds's.

HMRC doesnt suffer from a lack of income tax,its mainly benefit fraud and business tax fraud that is crippling the economy and the hugely over-inflated mp expense accounts which cost the country millions per year and probably billions seen as its never become such a big issue untill now.

RED ARMY 2008:only the mega rich dont play the lotto,most people do

Last night the prize pot was £7.8m. That means that 15.6 million tickets were bought. Even assuming everyone only bought 1, that's about 30% of the population (over 16 yrs old). Hardly most people.

RED ARMY 2008:now as far as im aware the gambling tax got removed years ago so nobody pays any tax on the price of the ticket only the profits camelot makes are subject to tax.

http://www.national-lottery.co.uk/player/information.do?info=wheremoneygoes

RED ARMY 2008:cigs and booze are taxed mainly for health reasons as they have many side effects which is why to CORRECT YOU i will state that i dont smoke and drink very little booze except on special occasions which even then il be lucky to get through a couple of blue wkds's.

Do you really think that the tax on alcohol and cigarettes goes into healthcare pot at the revenue? Or do you think that the government is purely thinking of your best interest when it puts an extra 5 pence on a bottle of Thunderbird?

mooreaz:Hey there JJ. Is that a no?

You guessed it M! Still grinding away iin an empty showroom...

GOOD LUCK TO ANYONE PLAYING BUT MOOREAZ TONIGHT.!!!!

Well that's not very charitable, is it?!?

How did you do?