Investing vs. Gambling

Since I have been teaching Crown I have had a number of students defend gambling with God's money by saying it is the equivalent of investing. Today Chuck Bentley addressed this topic and I thought I would share it here. Here are some tidbits from the article:

The huge difference between gambling and investing is the probability of return. It’s astronomically different. You can check online the Dow Jones average going back to 1920. Look at it over the last 8 years. You’ll find that it has always gone up over time. The graph looks like saw teeth, but it always goes up. The average annual return of investments in the stock market since 1926 are 6.2%. The average annual return when you buy a lottery ticket is zero.

Here’s a word picture to show the probability of winning the lottery: Draw a line between the earth and the moon, about 250,000 miles. You buy a lottery ticket, and you get to purchase 12 inches between here and the moon. That’s your probability of winning, the odds of picking a spot within your 12 inches.

Click on the picture to read the article.