THIS AUTHOR DOESN’T GET IT: She’s obviously never been one of the “needy.”  Right now, we can buy lottery or not, take it or leave it.  BUT when we were incredibly broke, we bought the lottery every weekend.  And we were never disappointed.  You see, we weren’t really buying a chance at millions.  We knew that was unlikely.  (My husband’s degree is Pure Math.) We were buying a chance to dream. Between whenever we bought the lottery and the drawing, we spent all that money a billion different ways, and forgot for a moment that we didn’t actually have enough spare money to buy new paperback books or, you know, buy a movie ticket, or meat for dinner. It was totally worth it. Why Big Powerball Jackpots are Bad For Us.