They say lightning never strikes twice. Tell that to the Arizona couple who are celebrating their second lottery win this week. Diane and Kerry Carmichael will bring home a cool $1 million as second prize winners in this week's Powerball.
Considering they already won $2.5 million in December 1995, they should be done now, right? Yeah, not so much ...
Diane says they will keep on playing the lottery:
Good things come in threes. Two down, one to go.
Hey, I get it, $3.5 million is not what it used to be. It's not a guarantee that you can live the good life. The Carmichaels said they're going to talk to their financial planner and resist the urge to "splurge" after their big win.
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But that's not going to keep them from spending money on more tickets.
Come on, y'all! Whatever happened to bowing out gracefully? Because once you've won the lottery twice, going for number three sounds a little ... greedy?
Go ahead, call it sour grapes because I've never won the lottery. It's true. I haven't. Then again, I've never actually played the lottery. It's just not my thing.
So let's move on to the next theory, shall we? I'm a big fan of playing fair. And trying for a third lottery win when you've already won big twice just doesn't sound fair to me.
It's kind of like the high school coach leaving in his best players when his team is already up by 100. You don't have to guarantee other people a win, but for crying out loud, you can at least give them a sporting chance!
Maybe if the Carmichaels were talking about sharing some of their not-so-hard-won cash with local charities, they'd sound a little less greedy? Or maybe I am just jealous.
Who knows! The good thing of course, is the lottery is a game of chance. There's no more guarantee that the Carmichaels will win again than there is that anyone will strike it rich.
Let's hope next time the big check goes to someone who really needs it ...
Do you think lottery winners should be allowed to play again? When should they be cut off?
Image via rockinfree/Flickr
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Comments 31
Ok, so by your logic, Tiger Woods should have "bowed out" after his first Masters win. Michael Jordan should have stepped down after the first time he won a championship. Pick an NFL Team - they should stop playing well after they win the Super Bowl. All so that it will be "fair" for the other players?
If you win a card game (or trivia or whatever the game is) when you're playing with a group of friends at a party, do you then put your cards down and say, "Ok, I won this round, now I'm going to stop playing so that all of you can win. And then after everyone has won a game, then I'll start playing again!"
I didn't think so.
The fact is, those people have exactly the same chance of winning the lottery as every other person who plays - the odds are based on the numbers, not on how many people play. And when they win, it's their prerogative to spend the money however they choose - by donating it all to charity or blowing it all on fancy cars and gin.
Why should they stop? Its a game, they pay to play. They have every right to continue. Should ever football team that ever won a superbowl stop playing? No. Thats just foolish.
Jealous much??
So should all the countries CEOs (who make more in a year than what these 2 have won in almost twenty years) quit after a year so it's "fair" and that guy flipping burgers has a chance at nabbing that position? Should Bill Gates close down Microsoft and not sell another product so that family raising 8 kids on welfare has a "fair" shot at making it big?
Because those things make about as much sense as saying people playing the lottery who won make it "unfair" for non-winners.
And seriously, they won 2.5 million almost 20 years ago. They won 1 million now. They probably had to pay about half of all that in taxes. That's not exactly the huge jackpot everyone is hoping for with the lottery. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to win that kinda money, but it's just not the huge jackpot that people think of with the lottery.
If anyone seems greedy its the person writing this article.