Lucky vs. Good Revisited

The NY Times today published the sad story of Lottery Winner Mack Metcalf and his estranged wife Virginia Merida. Back in 2000, they won a $34M lottery. More recently, Mack died of alcohol and Virginia died of drugs. Clearly, winning the lottery is a "Lucky" event. But being the daughter of drug dealers is even more unlucky. And having an alcohol addiction is most definitely not "Good".

"Any problems people have, money magnifies it so much", said one of Virginia's brothers. This makes me wonder if perhaps Lucky vs. Good is really just a cover for the Nature vs. Nurture debate?

Good = Nature. You are either born with the ability to be good or you are not.
Luck = Nurture. You either had the good fortune of parents who saved for your college education (definitely Lucky for you), or your folks didn't bother reading to you at night (so sorry).

The old adage is "the better you are, the luckier you get". It seems that we might need a disclaimer on Lottery ticket purchases: Warning, unless you are good, you should not play the lottery - It will bring you nothing but bad luck.

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