Idaho United States
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Quote: Originally posted by Stack47 on Apr 3, 2013
There was only one 5 + 0 last night and they only got $201,115. Race tracks take their percentage cut off the top of each pool and payoffs are determined by the number of winning tickets in each pool. A percentage of MM sales is applied to the jackpot and probably before their cut is deducted. I believe the 1 + 1 and 0 + 1 payoff are fixed, but including them, they still paid out 67% of their total MM sales to prizes.
Oh wait, maybe I spoke too soon. I didn't know there could be only one winner and they'd get less than the full prize amount. Hmmm that doesn't seem right.
Los Angeles, California United States
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Quote: Originally posted by HoLeeKau on Apr 3, 2013
Oh wait, maybe I spoke too soon. I didn't know there could be only one winner and they'd get less than the full prize amount. Hmmm that doesn't seem right.
Actually, you were correct in your initial assessment of CA pari-mutuel games.
If you compare fixed prize amounts of other states, versus the variable pari-mutuel prize amounts that CA has, over the long run, statistically they will even out. But it is kind of ironic that compared to other states, California, which has pari-mutuel for all draw games from MM down to P3, could be considered more honest!? They don't spend (pay in prizes) more than they take in (in ticket sales revenue) compared to the fixed prize amount of other states, who can sometimes get caught paying out a higher percentage in prizes than budgeted due to an unexpectedly large number of player's picks lining up with the drawn numbers. With pari-mutuel, the percentage paid out for each tier is always the same.
Here is the past 15 draws of CA MM that clearly shows what is going on with pari-mutuel and rollover for 5/5 prize tier:
Kentucky United States
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Quote: Originally posted by Jon D on Apr 3, 2013
Actually, you were correct in your initial assessment of CA pari-mutuel games.
If you compare fixed prize amounts of other states, versus the variable pari-mutuel prize amounts that CA has, over the long run, statistically they will even out. But it is kind of ironic that compared to other states, California, which has pari-mutuel for all draw games from MM down to P3, could be considered more honest!? They don't spend (pay in prizes) more than they take in (in ticket sales revenue) compared to the fixed prize amount of other states, who can sometimes get caught paying out a higher percentage in prizes than budgeted due to an unexpectedly large number of player's picks lining up with the drawn numbers. With pari-mutuel, the percentage paid out for each tier is always the same.
Here is the past 15 draws of CA MM that clearly shows what is going on with pari-mutuel and rollover for 5/5 prize tier:
Date
Jackpot
Revenue
5/5 wins
5/5 amt
5/5 percent
4/2/13
42M
$3,656,637
1
$201,115
5.50%
3/29/13
36M
$3,446,175
2
$264,531
15.35%
3/26/13
26M
$3,142,500
0
$339,524
10.80%
3/22/13
20M
$3,030,665
0
$166,686
5.50%
3/19/13
13M
$2,750,493
1
$151,276
5.50%
3/15/13
12M
$2,866,167
1
$157,639
5.50%
3/12/13
41M
$3,590,947
1
$197,502
5.50%
3/8/13
33M
$3,232,039
1
$177,762
5.50%
3/5/13
26M
$2,968,975
1
$322,019
10.85%
3/1/13
19M
$2,885,923
0
$158,725
5.50%
2/26/13
13M
$2,649,669
1
$630,786
23.81%
2/22/13
12M
$2,727,666
0
$485,055
17.78%
2/19/13
26M
$3,052,093
0
$335,033
10.98%
2/15/13
20M
$3,039,425
0
$167,168
5.50%
2/12/13
13M
$2,943,027
1
$161,866
5.50%
"If you compare fixed prize amounts of other states, versus the variable pari-mutuel prize amounts that CA has, over the long run, statistically they will even out."
I don't know how you figure that because California ranks 39 out of 43 states/jurisdictions on the percentage of the total sales paid out in prizes with 53%. The national average is about 62%. Your chart shows only four out of ten 5 + 0 winners benefited. The odds against matching 5 + 0 are bad enough and most of the winners got on average $75,000 less than in the other 43 states/jurisdictions. People in other states are winning $1 million for having the same ticket the same night someone in CA wins $151,000.
"But it is kind of ironic that compared to other states, California, which has pari-mutuel for all draw games from MM down to P3, could be considered more honest!?"
Lot's of people play triples in Pick-3 games and it doesn't matter how many other players hit because they get the fixed payout. I believe PA had over 10,000 winning Pick-3 tickets one night when a triple was drawn. A $1 straight ticket paid $500; how much would it pay in the more "honest" state lottery?
Los Angeles, California United States
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Quote: Originally posted by Stack47 on Apr 3, 2013
"If you compare fixed prize amounts of other states, versus the variable pari-mutuel prize amounts that CA has, over the long run, statistically they will even out."
I don't know how you figure that because California ranks 39 out of 43 states/jurisdictions on the percentage of the total sales paid out in prizes with 53%. The national average is about 62%. Your chart shows only four out of ten 5 + 0 winners benefited. The odds against matching 5 + 0 are bad enough and most of the winners got on average $75,000 less than in the other 43 states/jurisdictions. People in other states are winning $1 million for having the same ticket the same night someone in CA wins $151,000.
"But it is kind of ironic that compared to other states, California, which has pari-mutuel for all draw games from MM down to P3, could be considered more honest!?"
Lot's of people play triples in Pick-3 games and it doesn't matter how many other players hit because they get the fixed payout. I believe PA had over 10,000 winning Pick-3 tickets one night when a triple was drawn. A $1 straight ticket paid $500; how much would it pay in the more "honest" state lottery?
You are conflating two different percentages: the overall percent of revenue returned as prizes for the entire state lottery as a whole, versus just a single multistate jackpot game, which is what I was referring to.
Yes, CA lottery was 53% total percentage of revenue returned as prizes in 2010. 2011 was 55%. 2012 was 59%. Each state varies year to year, with a starting point around 50%,(and some less than 50%) and the amount above that depends largely on what percentage of sales were scratch tickets compared to lotto/draw games. (also depends on multistate jackpot wins) Scratch tickets typically return more than 60% in prizes, compared to draw/lotto returning less than 50%.
And the megaplier and powerplay actually reduce the overall return for players as a whole, even though they provide better return on the lower prize tiers. The lottery would love everyone to play with powerplay/megaplier every time. You can't directly compare pari-mutuel prizes without powerplay/megaplier side bets to states with powerplay/megaplier.
As for pick 3, yes in some states, the players could make out quite well as you mentioned with the example. But the lottery has a budget, and somewhere down the line, they may have to trim some of the prize percentage from another game to cover the losses from a high payout P3 or other overpaid game. That's the reality.
Kentucky United States
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Quote: Originally posted by Jon D on Apr 4, 2013
You are conflating two different percentages: the overall percent of revenue returned as prizes for the entire state lottery as a whole, versus just a single multistate jackpot game, which is what I was referring to.
Yes, CA lottery was 53% total percentage of revenue returned as prizes in 2010. 2011 was 55%. 2012 was 59%. Each state varies year to year, with a starting point around 50%,(and some less than 50%) and the amount above that depends largely on what percentage of sales were scratch tickets compared to lotto/draw games. (also depends on multistate jackpot wins) Scratch tickets typically return more than 60% in prizes, compared to draw/lotto returning less than 50%.
And the megaplier and powerplay actually reduce the overall return for players as a whole, even though they provide better return on the lower prize tiers. The lottery would love everyone to play with powerplay/megaplier every time. You can't directly compare pari-mutuel prizes without powerplay/megaplier side bets to states with powerplay/megaplier.
As for pick 3, yes in some states, the players could make out quite well as you mentioned with the example. But the lottery has a budget, and somewhere down the line, they may have to trim some of the prize percentage from another game to cover the losses from a high payout P3 or other overpaid game. That's the reality.
"But the lottery has a budget, and somewhere down the line, they may have to trim some of the prize percentage from another game to cover the losses from a high payout P3 or other overpaid game. That's the reality."
California has almost six times more potential lottery players than the state of Massachusetts, but the annual ticket sales are about $400 million more in MA. The net profit to ticket sales in Cali is 30.2% compared to 17.6% in MA so it's obvious MA has a much higher prize ratio. If California could just double their annual ticket sales by using the MA net profits to ticket sales ratio, their overall net profits would increase by $219 million.
In most states lotteries, scratch-offs account for more than 60% of the total ticket sales and the ticket sales to prize ratio is much lower in Cali and probably why their sales volume is so low. A 10% increase in the prize ratio would decrease the net profit to sales ratio but because of the potential for more players, could double the total sales giving Cali a much higher bottom line.
The MA budget is based on the number of ticket sales and they must decide if lowering the prize ratio will decrease the volume where they might make even less in net profits. And Cali must decide if increasing the prize ratio will increase the volume of play enough to make more in net profits.
The PB pari-mutual payoffs for matching five numbers ought to be interesting and hopefully the average will remain close to $1. If not the California PB players might wait for the jackpot to be over $250 before they play.
NY United States
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Quote: Originally posted by JKING on Apr 3, 2013
So, let's say there are four 5 of 5 winners in a given state...
California...recieves $1,000,000 to split four ways.
Non-parimutual State B recieves $4,000,000 to be split 4 ways.
Does that sound about right? It would make California legislative sense. *L*
Not even close to right. With "multistate" games only the jackpot prize is a game involving other states. All of the other prizes are completely independent of what happens in other states.
Each participating state collects the money from the tickets sold by that state, and contributes a percentage of the money towards the jackpot prize. For PB and MM it's about 32%. The rest of the money is kept within the state to pay all of the other prizes, the cost of running the game, and profit to the lottery.
In the case of PB, each state allocates 9.7019% of ticket sales to the second place prize pool. At $2 per ticket that's 19.4038 cents for every ticket sold. If a state sells 5,153,633 million tickets that would add up to $1,000,000.640054. You might notice that the number of tickets I used happens to match the odds of winning the 2nd place prize, and the amount of money happens to be almost exactly what the standard payout is for the 2nd place prize.
Individual players are hoping to have results that are not what probability suggests. The lotteries count on having results that are what probability suggests, and they sell enough tickets for that to happen. In the long run each state will have very close to 1 2nd place winner for every 5,153,633 tickets they sell, and in turn that means that for every winner they will collect very close to the $1 million that they pay to each winner.
Of course things don't always turn out exactly the way probability suggests, so a small state might have to pay a $1 million prize after selling only 1 million tickets, and that puts them in the red until they sell another 4.15 million tickets. Conversely, they may sell 7 million tickets withut having a winner, and have "extra" profit until they get a couple of winners to bring things back towards the expected long term result. All states have a rule that allows them to pay prizes on a parimutuel basis if there are an unusually high number of winners for some reason. California just makes that the norm, so that they are guaranteed to pay out the exact percentage that has been allocated to each prize level.
NY United States
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Quote: Originally posted by JKING on Apr 3, 2013
STD
PRIZE
DATE
5/5 WINS
PAYOUT
AMOUNT
DIFF.
2-Apr
1
250000
"-"
201115
"="
48885
29-Mar
2
500000
"-"
264531
"="
235469
26-Mar
0
22-Mar
0
19-Mar
1
250000
"-"
151276
"="
98724
15-Mar
1
250000
"-"
157639
"="
92361
12-Mar
1
250000
"-"
197502
"="
52498
8-Mar
1
250000
"-"
177762
"="
72238
5-Mar
1
250000
"-"
322019
"="
-72019
1-Mar
0
26-Feb
1
250000
"-"
630786
"="
-380786
22-Feb
0
19-Feb
0
15-Feb
0
12-Feb
1
250000
"-"
161866
"="
88134
8-Feb
1
250000
"-"
155983
"="
94017
5-Feb
2
500000
"-"
245064
"="
254936
1-Feb
0
29-Jan
0
25-Jan
2
500000
"-"
156712
"="
343288
22-Jan
2
500000
"-"
140688
"="
359312
18-Jan
1
250000
"-"
272736
"="
-22736
15-Jan
4
2000000
"-"
57611
"="
1942389
11-Jan
1
250000
"-"
427749
"="
-177749
8-Jan
0
4-Jan
1
250000
"-"
572376
"="
-322376
1-Jan
0
TOTAL
2706585
Hmmm, looks to me like California's Mega Millions paid out $2,706,585 less than the standard payout since the first of the year.
Fair??????
"Fair??????"
Not if you think one California winner should get just as much as the total that was paid to 4 winners in other states, which is what you've shown in your chart:
DATE
5/5 WINS
PAYOUT
AMOUNT
DIFF.
15-Jan
4
2000000
"-"
57611
"="
1942389
OTOH, if you want to compare what individual winners in other states got to what individual winners in califormia got you need to look at the average amount that each winner collected. For most states that's the standard $250,000. California paid ten 2nd place prizes totalling $2,519 027, for an average of $251,902.70 each.
The period is a little short for reliable statistics, but over that period the california players did a bit better than players in other states. In th elong run probability guarantees that the average payout will be very close tho the fixed $250,000 payout in other states.
Los Angeles, California United States
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Quote: Originally posted by RedStang on Apr 9, 2013
Whats the point of having this. Are they afraid of going broke from multiple winners. If we had this i might only buy 1 ticket.
Well, they won't go broke, it's just that they may not meet their funding percentage. So they'd have to shuffle the numbers around and maybe pull back on some other prizes on other games or special promotions like raffles, etc.
Pari-mutuel pretty much guarantees that they'll meet their expected funding targets, and not be surprized by an unexpected prize liability that is far outside of the statistical probability.
I'm not used to looking at this whole Powerball thing here in CA, since we just got it. I just realized how terribly underfunded the top prize is on PB compared to MM. The top prize for PB is not fully funded until it approaches the $100M mark or the 6th roll, and they do not meet the overall funding target until the Jackpot reaches about $250M range. Still not sure exactly where the JP payments for the shortfall comes from.
NY United States
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October 16, 2005
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Quote: Originally posted by Jon D on Apr 10, 2013
Well, they won't go broke, it's just that they may not meet their funding percentage. So they'd have to shuffle the numbers around and maybe pull back on some other prizes on other games or special promotions like raffles, etc.
Pari-mutuel pretty much guarantees that they'll meet their expected funding targets, and not be surprized by an unexpected prize liability that is far outside of the statistical probability.
I'm not used to looking at this whole Powerball thing here in CA, since we just got it. I just realized how terribly underfunded the top prize is on PB compared to MM. The top prize for PB is not fully funded until it approaches the $100M mark or the 6th roll, and they do not meet the overall funding target until the Jackpot reaches about $250M range. Still not sure exactly where the JP payments for the shortfall comes from.
PB seems to have committed a bit more to the long term results than the other games, and it seems to be working. If they had doubled the price without raising the starting jackpot they would probably have lost even more players than they did. That would have resulted in small increases, and lower average jackpot offerings. By risking some minor losses if there's a winner in one of the first few rolls they've increased their gross income compared to what it was before the price increase. The occasional loss is easily offset when the game's format leads to unusually large jackpots. Payment for those occasional shortfalls comes from their reliance on the long term probability.
Every state has a rule allowing them to make parimutuel payments if the number of winners exceeds statistical probability, so California certainly doesn't need that in order to ensure that they don't make their projected profit. Maybe the legislators who came up with the requiremen had a better reason, but I'm thinking that they just didn't understand, or didn't belive in the probability. I haven't seen any reports about it, but perhaps the reason it took California so long to offer PB was that those occasional underfunded jackpots didn't fit their parimutuel paradigm.
Morrison, IL United States
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Quote: Originally posted by Jon D on Apr 10, 2013
Well, they won't go broke, it's just that they may not meet their funding percentage. So they'd have to shuffle the numbers around and maybe pull back on some other prizes on other games or special promotions like raffles, etc.
Pari-mutuel pretty much guarantees that they'll meet their expected funding targets, and not be surprized by an unexpected prize liability that is far outside of the statistical probability.
I'm not used to looking at this whole Powerball thing here in CA, since we just got it. I just realized how terribly underfunded the top prize is on PB compared to MM. The top prize for PB is not fully funded until it approaches the $100M mark or the 6th roll, and they do not meet the overall funding target until the Jackpot reaches about $250M range. Still not sure exactly where the JP payments for the shortfall comes from.
As far as jackpot funding goes, if Powerball sales for this Wednesday's draw mirror sales of last Wednesday's draw, the current PB jackpot of $80 million ($51.6 million cash) IS fully funded (sales actually support a $53 million cash jackpot, but the MUSL has to shave its jackpot to replenish its set prize/guaranteed jackpot emergency funds).