[Poll] 1 mill or 1 billion - Page 2

On April 07 2015 01:46 bigredhoss wrote: Show nested quote + On April 06 2015 23:58 Baalim wrote: Im pretty shocked so many of you would take the million... come on its a thousands time the reward, unless you lived in extreme poverty in a 3rd world country where 1 mill is huge just take the flip a million dollars is still a lot of money pretty much everywhere and life-changing for most people. the most valuable resource we have is time, so let's say the average person here is 25 and has about 60 years left. even with a pretty good-paying job, it will still take most people at least 10 years to accumulate $1mln (after taxes, living expenses, etc), and a lot probably won't do it until they're close to retirement age. obviously there's jobs that can do it in less time, but they aren't attainable for most. i don't know about any actual data on the subject, but from listening to people it seems like the vast majority don't love their jobs. they might be interested in their field and find certain aspects rewarding, but overall i'm guessing most would happily quit if they were guaranteed financial security. for someone who isn't obsessed with climbing the wealth ladder, $1mln is enough to never have to work again if they diversify it in low-risk investments to hedge against inflation. one decade++ spending the majority of your waking hours doing something you'd prefer not to be doing, during the peak physical years of your life, is a huge burden that a million dollars can lift. i also don't think being 1000x the amount of money is a good way to look at it. what's the real utility of having $1billion vs 500 million vs 100 million? i realize the answer is different for everyone, but i think for me there wouldn't be much difference. all that said i probably still take the flip for $1 billion, but i don't think it's ridiculous at all to take a guaranteed million.

I think people overestimate how much 1 million is nowadays its not going to be easy to live the rest of your life from interests with inflation and the utility difference between 1M and 1B is HUGE... 1B is basically infinite money and while I dont even care much about making a lot of money it would be pretty nice to not care about money for the rest of my life.

Just for the lulz I flipped I coin and won!!!..... suck it you poor millionares you are not invited to my Yatch... no nits allowed

Like I said before, I'd for sure take the flip for a billion. I've never been one to be scared of gambles/play it safe. It is tempting to just walk away with the million for fear of getting nothing, don't get me wrong. But if I walked away with the 1 million I wouldn't be able to live with myself. I'd spend the rest of my life wondering what the outcome of the flip would have been. The same sort of feeling you get when you don't ask out a girl you'd like to. Everything turns out ok down the road more or less, but you always wonder/regret what would/could have been if you went through with it. Anyone have a similar thought process?

Idk if this makes sense, not that great at explaining myself.

snap pick the mill

On April 07 2015 02:08 Floofy wrote: I don't think you've read my post?? Given 2 chances, you will surely use your first chance on the billion. Then if you do get the bil, you will surely go for bil again. But if it fails, then you go back to the initial question.

I did read your post! I promise

Some people would still not do that. For some people the certainty of the 2 million dollars will be worth more than the .5 chance to win 1B and the guaranteed 1M, or the 2 chances for the billion.

On April 07 2015 02:08 Baalim wrote: Show nested quote + On April 07 2015 01:46 bigredhoss wrote:   On April 06 2015 23:58 Baalim wrote: Im pretty shocked so many of you would take the million... come on its a thousands time the reward, unless you lived in extreme poverty in a 3rd world country where 1 mill is huge just take the flip a million dollars is still a lot of money pretty much everywhere and life-changing for most people. the most valuable resource we have is time, so let's say the average person here is 25 and has about 60 years left. even with a pretty good-paying job, it will still take most people at least 10 years to accumulate $1mln (after taxes, living expenses, etc), and a lot probably won't do it until they're close to retirement age. obviously there's jobs that can do it in less time, but they aren't attainable for most. i don't know about any actual data on the subject, but from listening to people it seems like the vast majority don't love their jobs. they might be interested in their field and find certain aspects rewarding, but overall i'm guessing most would happily quit if they were guaranteed financial security. for someone who isn't obsessed with climbing the wealth ladder, $1mln is enough to never have to work again if they diversify it in low-risk investments to hedge against inflation. one decade++ spending the majority of your waking hours doing something you'd prefer not to be doing, during the peak physical years of your life, is a huge burden that a million dollars can lift. i also don't think being 1000x the amount of money is a good way to look at it. what's the real utility of having $1billion vs 500 million vs 100 million? i realize the answer is different for everyone, but i think for me there wouldn't be much difference. all that said i probably still take the flip for $1 billion, but i don't think it's ridiculous at all to take a guaranteed million. I think people overestimate how much 1 million is nowadays its not going to be easy to live the rest of your life from interests with inflation and the utility difference between 1M and 1B is HUGE... 1B is basically infinite money and while I dont even care much about making a lot of money it would be pretty nice to not care about money for the rest of my life.

agree with everything you said, but the difference between ~100k and 1 million is also huge. you won't live a life of luxury collecting interest on 1 million for sure, but you don't necessarily need to be worried about money either, it just depends on the person and what they want in life. with a million, you could at least spend your time doing mostly what you want, it's enough to escape the daily grind while living a modest lifestyle.

you're basically giving up the chance for guaranteed autonomy and freedom during the best years of your life, for the chance to flip a coin where if you win you get god-money, if you lose then you lose your freedom for those years. i think for someone who's working 40-60 hours a week and counting the days to when he can quit, a million makes perfect sense.

I think the majority of middle class people would flip, that being said i think another interesting question is how much of a guaranteed reward would start to become more attractive than flipping for a billion. In my opinion, if I had the option for accepting as low as 4 million guaranteed I would accept it just because that's enough to have a large house, a few big toys, funds set for the kids, and the left over spread over various investments so you that you don't need to work if you don't want to. For the average sane person, I think it would be difficult to spend past tens of millions, let alone hundreds just for pleasure (without being retarded like buying gold toilets). If I had a billion I would be using atleast 90% for donating to low income housing for people who have jobs but cant yet fully support their families, and education for women in foreign countries so we lower dem birthrates.

On April 07 2015 02:32 HungarianGOD wrote: Show nested quote + On April 07 2015 02:08 Floofy wrote: I don't think you've read my post?? Given 2 chances, you will surely use your first chance on the billion. Then if you do get the bil, you will surely go for bil again. But if it fails, then you go back to the initial question. I did read your post! I promise Some people would still not do that. For some people the certainty of the 2 million dollars will be worth more than the .5 chance to win 1B and the guaranteed 1M, or the 2 chances for the billion.

Oh ok now i do understand your post. Maybe i'm the one who didn't read yours properly ^_^

I guess your right, but i think those people would be making a mistake

Why is there even a poll, the difference is way too huge to even think about. I would understand if it were done in Eastern European countries, but there s no valid reason for anyone in Western Europe/US to take the mil
Unless you have some very legit investment ideas and don't feel like gambling, and don't want to buy Charlie's chocolate factory

99.99% of the poeple living in any 1st world country should go for the 1billion. can't even believe how ppl think this is anywhere close.

a better question would be 100m vs the 1 b, or 1 m vs 10 m. the answers would be much more illuminating.

On April 07 2015 08:22 mnj wrote: 99.99% of the poeple living in any 1st world country should go for the 1billion. can't even believe how ppl think this is anywhere close. a better question would be 100m vs the 1 b, or 1 m vs 10 m. the answers would be much more illuminating.

100m v 1B is also silly, the utility difference is minimal... but 1M or 10M would be a rough one but id still flip

On April 07 2015 01:58 HungarianGOD wrote: Show nested quote + On April 06 2015 23:27 Floofy wrote:   On April 06 2015 23:23 HungarianGOD wrote: How many times do I get to play the game? ;-) I don't think this matters much. If given 2 flips, i think the first flip going to the bil is a no brainer. Then if you win, your second decision is obviously going to be the bil again. But if you lost, its the same as if u were given a single flip lol It matters a ton; in finance the risk of a decision is almost as important as the expectation of an event (and I say almost because of 1 specific exception). Everybody always wants to maximize expectation, but people have very different ways of valuing different kinds of risks; an individual's personal function for measuring the value of a decision based on the combination of both the expectation and the different risks of that decision is an individual's "utility function". Utility functions can be drastically different from person to person. Most people here are not particularly risk adverse... We are all poker players, and in most situations we very happy to add additional risk in order to increase expectation. As such, I'd guess most people here (myself included) would take the flip for a billion. However, most of us have lines we will not cross. I leave you with an oft cited example in finance demonstrating this, that even for those of us who are very risk adverse, we almost always have our limits The scenario is this: There is a game that somebody is considering letting you play. In this game, you get to flip a fair coin, and you keep flipping it until you get heads. Once you get heads, the game stops, and you walk away with whatever you have won. If you get heads on the first flip, you walk away with $1, but for every time you get tails, the amount you win doubles. The question is this: How much would YOU pay to be willing to play this game? If you are purely trying to go with the most +EV thing to do, the answer is any finite sum of money. You would be willing to pay the entire GDP of the planet earth ^1000000 in order to play this game once, even though in the vast majority of the time you will win a paltry sum. The reason is the expected value of playing this game once if infinite. Mathematical demonstration: + Show Spoiler + let 'a' = the value of event a happening, and p(a) the probability that event 'a' happens Definition of EV: p(a) * a + p(b) *b + ... + p(n) * n + ... In this case, we get p($1) * $1 + p($2) *$2 + p($4) * $4 + ... + p($2^n)*$2^n + ... = 1/2 * $1 + 1/4 * $2 + 1/8 * $4 + ... + (1/2)^n * $2^(n-1) + ... = 1/2 + 1/2 + 1/2 + ... + 1/2 + ... = infinity So the expectation is infinite.

bernoulli's famous st petersburg paradox.. pls dont confuse its origin with a vulgar base field like finance

On April 07 2015 02:08 Floofy wrote: Show nested quote + On April 07 2015 01:58 HungarianGOD wrote:   On April 06 2015 23:27 Floofy wrote:   On April 06 2015 23:23 HungarianGOD wrote: How many times do I get to play the game? ;-) I don't think this matters much. If given 2 flips, i think the first flip going to the bil is a no brainer. Then if you win, your second decision is obviously going to be the bil again. But if you lost, its the same as if u were given a single flip lol It matters a ton; in finance the risk of a decision is almost as important as the expectation of an event (and I say almost because of 1 specific exception). Everybody always wants to maximize expectation, but people have very different ways of valuing different kinds of risks; an individual's personal function for measuring the value of a decision based on the combination of both the expectation and the different risks of that decision is an individual's "utility function". Utility functions can be drastically different from person to person. Most people here are not particularly risk adverse... We are all poker players, and in most situations we very happy to add additional risk in order to increase expectation. As such, I'd guess most people here (myself included) would take the flip for a billion. However, most of us have lines we will not cross. I leave you with an oft cited example in finance demonstrating this, that even for those of us who are very risk adverse, we almost always have our limits The scenario is this: There is a game that somebody is considering letting you play. In this game, you get to flip a fair coin, and you keep flipping it until you get heads. Once you get heads, the game stops, and you walk away with whatever you have won. If you get heads on the first flip, you walk away with $1, but for every time you get tails, the amount you win doubles. The question is this: How much would YOU pay to be willing to play this game? If you are purely trying to go with the most +EV thing to do, the answer is any finite sum of money. You would be willing to pay the entire GDP of the planet earth ^1000000 in order to play this game once, even though in the vast majority of the time you will win a paltry sum. The reason is the expected value of playing this game once if infinite. Mathematical demonstration: + Show Spoiler + let 'a' = the value of event a happening, and p(a) the probability that event 'a' happens Definition of EV: p(a) * a + p(b) *b + ... + p(n) * n + ... In this case, we get p($1) * $1 + p($2) *$2 + p($4) * $4 + ... + p($2^n)*$2^n + ... = 1/2 * $1 + 1/4 * $2 + 1/8 * $4 + ... + (1/2)^n * $2^(n-1) + ... = 1/2 + 1/2 + 1/2 + ... + 1/2 + ... = infinity So the expectation is infinite. I don't think you've read my post?? Given 2 chances, you will surely use your first chance on the billion. Then if you do get the bil, you will surely go for bil again. But if it fails, then you go back to the initial question.

for fun think about how your answer changes if you have to decide ex-ante whether to take two flips or $2m and can't change in between

Easy decision

$1 million easily for me, thats a shitload of money in brazil and would settle my life in the bat of an eye

All the money in the world cannot bring you happiness but a little bit can make a big difference.

Had a mil before, wasn't life changing. Flip it all day!

HungarianDOG typing with his buttcheeks again, lmao. Spitfiree are you wearing your tinfoil hat again? What the fuck is the difference between eastern-european countries and western-european/USA to make a stupid comparison like that? wtf retard.

I'd flip and if i won i'd buy the yacht and invite Baal. This isn't even close for me..
although i can see why many would snap 1mil with the biggest advantage going for 1mil is getting it instantly.

How about this idea: you get to design the game for yourself in a parallel universe, what do you think the other you would flip for?

http://youtu.be/JN0UO-vURpk?t=40

On April 06 2015 23:58 Baalim wrote: Im pretty shocked so many of you would take the million... come on its a thousands time the reward, unless you lived in extreme poverty in a 3rd world country where 1 mill is huge just take the flip

1 mill on top of what I have now means I'm set for life even if I only work 20-25 hour weeks, which to me seems like the ideal amount. If I won 1 billion, I'd still want to work equally much. 1 million would ensure me an extra 10-15 hours of spare time every week for the next 40 years of my life. And I honestly have little interest in the things I can't get for $1 mill + expected income, I guess it'd be nice to go completely foodie crazy and drink shots of 100 year old balsamic vinegar, but I don't really want to live in a huge mansion, I don't want maids, I don't want watches or jewelry, I don't want coke, I don't want strippers or whores, I don't want a private jet or yacht or a ferrari.. I also don't want to spend time investing or managing money, nor do I care much about establishing any business of any kind. Philanthropy would be sweet, but not at the 50% chance of ending up with 0.

it's kinda like, to me, if 0 money is worth 0 and 100 billion is worth 100, then $1 million would be worth 80-90.

seems like many of you are neglecting that half the time you choose to flip you actually lose and you have to live with knowing that you just gave away $1 million.

I also understand that if you have more money than me and different life goals it becomes a no-brainer just the other way around, but for me, it's really not close.