this post was submitted on 19 May 2025
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You made an over generalized statement that "most people" waste a windfall, which clearly isn't true with our current evidence. Yeah nothing as outlandish as this hypothetical has ever happened, but I feel more comfortable projecting that ~173 million people getting a wealth bump will look more like those large scale programs than a few dozen lottery winners.
BTW there's no evidence to even support your lottery bankruptcy stat. Multiple studies confirm that winning the lottery improves long term quality of life and most people spend their winnings over time with no evidence of extravagant waste.
Literally the first article you cited makes note of the fact that all of the previously published literature found no evidence that people became significantly happier after winning the lottery (links are provided there so I won't repeat them here). Unfortunately I cannot read the rest of the article since it's paywalled.
In the second study, the vast majority of the sample consists of people winning smaller sums (over 80% won less than $200k, which is certainly enough to fix the most pressing issues in your life, like a leaking roof or being behind on rent, but likely not enough to build a foundation for long-term wealth). Also, consider that this happened in an environment where the average person did NOT win the lottery, which is important because a massive shift in wealth distribution could have a significant effect on demand curves and would likely cause a huge change in market prices for nearly every good on the market.