To think that it's deeply immoral for Lottery to sell a £10 scratchcard

[Nuphonewhodis]

I've been popping in to my new local corner shop the past few days, and many of those times i've seen the same few people buying the £10 scratchcard. Now I know that appearances can be deceiving and all but these people clearly seem like they're struggling money wise - tatty and holed clothing, very thin coats etc.

Loads of people spend money on the Lottery who can easily afford it, but surely there are lots of people in real financial straits who see playing the Lottery as their chance out of this. A £2 ticket is fair enough, but £10 is loads of money! It seems exploitative and in some ways like it's manipulating already vulnerable people to part with significant amounts of money, especially if they buy it weekly which some of the people in my local seem to.

AIBU?

People make bad choices all the time they buy ,alcohol,drugs ,tobacco they cant really afford ,they buy takeaways rather than cook, you can disagree with people's choices but it's theirs to !ale .

It's OK Stinky, I didn't think someone with your arguments would understand the comparison.

make*

Janedoe5000
you are comparing slaves - who have no say in the matter by definition - and adults choosing to buy tickets. Yes, totally the same.

I understand that people like you take "the poor" in such low value that you think they are not as able as you to make their own decision.
Charming.

so tell me Janedoe5000, by the same token, you want to reinstate the right of vote proportional to financial situation? The poor being too stupid to vote, give them less - or none at all - right of vote?

So should shops also stop selling sweets, crisps and general junk food as the country has a severe issue with obese people. These people are actively adding to their problem which in turn costs tax payers millions in treatment. You cannot tell someone’s finances by a glance but you can 100% tell if someone is obese

and you should also stop credit allowing the vulnerable to go into debts for buying a sofa/tv set/ computer/ holiday on credit that will take years to clear off.

That's clearly immoral too.

@StinkyCandle I think a lot of lenders with extortionate rates for that kind of thing are immoral, yes.

I probably buy two £10 and 2 £5 scratch cards a week so about £30 ! However, on average you would get back about £20 . So the loss is about 33% . But chance of winning anything from £ 10 - £500 is possible !

This of course excluding the remote chance of being 'LUCKY' . I have won £250 twice and !£100 4 times.

A tip if buying a £10 card buy a £5 one you are statistical 66% likely to get £10 back !

Buy a £5 one as well. You are 66% likely to get a Win of at least £5...

YANBU It is a shame that concern about a situation is viewed as needing to wind your neck in.

I also think the 'rent to buy' household goods places are immoral too, but I would actually put them much higher up than the lottery.

I can afford it buy the way .. I am also not one of the great dispossessed !

I do wish though that the Guardian Newspaper would be made bankrupt
You can associate their thinking with all the kind of tripe and assumptions posted by some on this post !

By the way I am clearly uneducated.......

Nuphonewhodis
@worra would you prefer it if we all just stopped caring about each other and left everyone to it, no matter the situation?

YES! You have no say how other people spend their money, rich or poor. I'm puzzled why you think you do. I doubt very much you would appreciate a random person thinking they know better than you and pontificating about your purchases.

Yanbu I agree with you OP

And mainstream— are you being ironic?

am I the only one who's uncomfortable that, at the other end, the best way that a big group of Canadian teachers could think of to invest in for their pension fund was a lottery in the UK?

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll I'm not sure if you are being funny or not but OTPP is a huge and sophisticated institutional investor and they own a shit-ton of stuff in the UK from critical infrastructure to energy to real estate

No, I'm not trying to be funny. Fair enough that they don't only invest in the UK lottery, but if it's part of their portfolio then my point stands. Huge and sophisticated does not equal ethical and respectable. Comic Relief were criticised for investing in arms and tobacco. The Church of England had shares in Wonga. I'm sure that the majority of these two bodies' investments were/are in innocuous everyday things, but that in no way makes a proportion of unethical investments justifiable, however small that proportion is.

Crass analogy, I know, but serial killers spend the vast, vast majority of their lives not killing people - doesn't justify their significant criminal actions one bit.

I'm not sure on where i stand on the morality of scratch cards but I will say that I understand the impulse to buy them.
I don't have much money, and as such I dont participate in the normal lottery or buy the cards because i honestly cant afford to lose that money, but, I have been tempted (quite recently too) to spend as large a chunk of cash as I can (around £100) on cards in the hope that I can maybe double my money, or even more.
Obviously I haven't done this, and nor will I, because I absolutely cannot afford to lose £££. I cant afford to lose £10 tbh and I realise that the chances of winning are so small.

For context, I'm a full time mature student single parent. I'm not stupid by any stretch, but I am broke most of the time and being hard up can make you desperate and the less you have the more likely you are to chance it in the hopes of making some cash.

I can't say it bothers me either way. Yes some people are addicted but when you getting nmw you don't want to argue with a customer who wants a scratch card.

However I don't think we should be selling cakes, crisps and sweets to school children in the morning. It's quite sad to see a child eat a whole pack of chocolate biscuits for breakfast.