I assume the lottery is based on those numbered balls.
Here's a test:
http://www.webmath.com/lottery.html
I entered a simple lottery with the following constraints:
You must choose a sequence of 5 numbers correctly to win.
The lowest number you can choose is 2
The highest number you can choose is 55
A given number can only be chosen once per try (per lottery ticket, etc.)
The resultant chance of winning is 1/54 × 1/53 × 1/52 × 1/51 × 1/50 = 1/379,501,200 or one chance in about 380 million.
Now let's say the lottery ticket costs $5 and I buy 1 ticket per week, 52 tickets/ year for say, 20 years. 52 * 20 * $5 = $5,200 spent on tickets.
How has purchasing 1020 tickets improved my odds?
Basically, 380,000,000/1,000 = 380,000. In other words, after 20 years of buying weekly tickets my chances of winning are about the same as dying from a fireworks discharge in the USA (
http://www.nsc.org/lrs/statinfo/odds.htm)
Somebody who knows how to compute compound interest from regular deposits can probably provide you with the 20 year investment return from $5/week. I'll bet it's $15k-$20k at say, the S&P 20 yr average change.