Zero sum games

What does that mean again, and how does it apply to gambling and stocks?

anyone

I wont take it personal if this drifts away with no replys. .

It just means that for every winner, there is a loser. For example, college basketball coaches are expected to win or get fired, but they are in a zero sum game. Not everyone can win, and for every win, there's a loss that comes as well. I don't know what the exact numbers are, but say at the end of the year, all D1 coaches with have a total of 5,000 wins and 5,000 losses. Zero sum game.

Sportsbetting would not be a zero sum game, because the book's action is never exactly balanced on both sides, and sometimes isn't close. But for futures and options contracts, one person will win, and one person will lose on every one. Hope that helps.

Illini said:

Sportsbetting would not be a zero sum game, because the book's action is never exactly balanced on both sides, and sometimes isn't close. But for futures and options contracts, one person will win, and one person will lose on every one. Hope that helps.

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Sportsbettng is a zero sum game when you factor in the players and the books.:smoker2:

I agree that sportsbetting is a zero sum game, until someone wins a parlay. Then you would definately have to consider the book a player in the game.

Here is an obvious cut-n-paste, but it might helpZero-sum describes a situation in which a participant's gain (or loss) is exactly balanced by the losses (or gains) of the other participant(s). It is so named because when you add up the total gains of the participants and subtract the total losses then they will sum to zero. Cutting a cake is zero- or constant-sum because taking a larger piece for yourself reduces the amount of cake available for others. Situations where participants can all gain or suffer together, such as a country with an excess of bananas trading with an other country for their excess of apples where both benefit from the transaction, are referred to as non-zero-sum.

The concept was first developed in game theory and consequently zero-sum situations are often called zero-sum games though this does not imply that the concept, or game theory itself, applies only to what are commonly referred to as games. Optimal strategies for two-player zero-sum games can often be found using minimax strategies.

To treat a non-zero-sum situation as a zero-sum situation, or to believe that all situations are zero-sum situations, is called the zero-sum fallacy.

The Zero sum I now face is either go back to work or don't eat