Chicago man bets life savings on Cubs to win the World Series

[Tugg Speedman]

The real question is this a better investment than Disney or Apple?

Chicago man bets life savings on Cubs to win the World Series
By Mike Axisa | Baseball Writer
May 10, 2016 2:42 pm ET

http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/eye-on-baseball/25583152

The Cubs are, by no small margin, the best team in baseball this season. They're 24-6 overall, and are one of only 10 teams in history to win 24 of their first 30 games. Five of those nine teams went on to win the World Series.

According to Net One Sports, a Chicago man named Don Majewski feels so good about the Cubs this year that he bet just about his entire life savings on the team winning the World Series. Earlier this month he withdrew $200,000 from savings, flew to Las Vegas, and put it on the Cubs. Here's his ticket (photo via Net One Sports):



The Cubs have a 3-to-1 payout, so, as you can see on the ticket, Majewksi will make a $600,000 profit if the Cubs do indeed win the World Series for the first time in 108 years. After taxes and all that, he figures he's looking at about $530,000.

[Tugg Speedman]

I waited overnight before buying the ticket because I promised my wife I'd sleep on it," says the 54-year-old sanitation worker turned carpenter. "I've been watching the Cubs my whole life, and when you've been doing that, you know that this team is truly special," says Majewski.

He was a garbage man from Chicago with a polish last name.  He was probably making near $100k a year picking up trash (yes ... And that is why Chicago is bankrupt!)

[MU82]

I waited overnight before buying the ticket because I promised my wife I'd sleep on it," says the 54-year-old sanitation worker turned carpenter. "I've been watching the Cubs my whole life, and when you've been doing that, you know that this team is truly special," says Majewski.

He was a garbage man from Chicago with a polish last name.  He was probably making near $100k a year picking up trash (yes ... And that is why Chicago is bankrupt!)

Nicely done ... using this quirky, upbeat story to offer a wise crack and an opinion based purely on a guess.

I like to think that if he had been making $100K annually, he'd have more than $200K to his name, but maybe not. You know best ... or at least you claim to about pretty much every subject.

As for the wager itself ... all I'll say is that nobody alive today has gone broke betting against the Cubs winning the championship.

This guy has balls the size of garbage cans!

[martyconlonontherun]

Nicely done ... using this quirky, upbeat story to offer a wise crack and an opinion based purely on a guess.

I like to think that if he had been making $100K annually, he'd have more than $200K to his name, but maybe not. You know best ... or at least you claim to about pretty much every subject.

As for the wager itself ... all I'll say is that nobody alive today has gone broke betting against the Cubs winning the championship.

This guy has balls the size of garbage cans!

Not sure what I am arguing but I'm sure there are a lot of people making 100K annually (assuming he started off lower and gradually went up that high) and have less than $200K in cash. Also, the article says "almost his entire life savings." I wonder if almost is 55%.

[Tugg Speedman]

Nicely done ... using this quirky, upbeat story to offer a wise crack and an opinion based purely on a guess.

I like to think that if he had been making $100K annually, he'd have more than $200K to his name, but maybe not. You know best ... or at least you claim to about pretty much every subject.

As for the wager itself ... all I'll say is that nobody alive today has gone broke betting against the Cubs winning the championship.

This guy has balls the size of garbage cans!

Not if you make stupid bets like this.  Have to assume has does this kind of things all the time.

[mu03eng]

Fake ticket

[Herman Cain]

I don't gamble. But if I did I would require a helluva better return on the money. He can do better speculating in AAPL options.

[MU82]

Not if you make stupid bets like this.

Actually, I like this line a lot!

Nicely played, Heisy.

[Coleman]

If he collects garbage in Chicago, he has a pretty good pension. I'm assuming he feels he will be ok if he loses given his pension and social security.

The 200k is probably everything else he has saved.

I still wouldn't bet it on the Cubs, but I'm guessing this guy won't be destitute. If I'm wrong he's an idiot. Well, he's an idiot either way, just less of an idiot if he has a pension.

[rocket surgeon]

  "I promised my wife..."

  he's probably getting all kinds of mail from divorce attorneys, but how's he gonna pay their bill eeyyyn'a?

[rocket surgeon]

I don't gamble. But if I did I would require a helluva better return on the money. He can do better speculating in AAPL options.

that was exactly my thought-he should have placed his bet last december when they were 6 to 1 favs.  and then, just don't tell the old lady if they won or not come october   either, she'll wonder who the 19 year old you are "mentoring" is, or why you've switched to old milwaukee...lots of them

[Benny B]

Fake ticket

Yep.  You don't expose the bar code on a real ticket and then post it on the net.

[🏀]

I'll put a significant amount of money on both Chicago teams next weekend in Vegas.

[Blackhat]

Should have kept it on the dl.

If he wins doe...

[Coleman]

I'll put a significant amount of money on both Chicago teams next weekend in Vegas.

Where you gonna be? I love the Mandalay Bay

[🏀]

Where you gonna be? I love the Mandalay Bay

Venetian.

Mandalay Bay is just a bit too south for me.

[PBRme]

Nicely done ... using this quirky, upbeat story to offer a wise crack and an opinion based purely on a guess.

I like to think that if he had been making $100K annually, he'd have more than $200K to his name, but maybe not. You know best ... or at least you claim to about pretty much every subject.

As for the wager itself ... all I'll say is that nobody alive today has gone broke betting against the Cubs winning the championship.

This guy has balls the size of garbage cans!

http://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/dhr/dataset/current_employeenamessalariesandpositiontitles.html

Looks like Sanitation workers are in the mid 70's

[Tugg Speedman]

http://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/dhr/dataset/current_employeenamessalariesandpositiontitles.html

Looks like Sanitation workers are in the mid 70's

$70k to start, and they work 5 1/2 hours a day.  $90k with seniority (see Perry Brown near the bottom).

This is the quintessential article that shows what is wrong with Chicago and why it is going bankrupt.



Chicago Mayor Trashes Politics of Waste Removal
By Douglas Belkin
October 13, 2011

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052970203476804576612851452362670

At 6:45 on a recent morning, three burly men in yellow slickers piled into a city garbage truck for a two-mile ride to a weed-choked alley where a row of 96-gallon trash bins awaited.

Over the next few hours, the men emptied scores of black containers, hopping on and off their truck as they lumbered from block to block. It's a tough job but quitting time usually comes early. Total time worked on a typical shift: about 5½ hours, according to a city audit.

"Nobody works for the city for eight hours," said Kris Squalls, a 48-year-old Teamster who has driven a city garbage truck for 25 years and now makes about $70,000 a year. "Not the mayor, not anybody."

In garbage, the result is a grossly inefficient system dictated by generous union contracts and Byzantine ward politics. This combination has bought labor peace and satisfied local politicians, at the cost of zigzagging truck routes that waste time, fuel and taxpayer money.

During his 22 years in power, Mr. Emanuel's predecessor, Richard M. Daley, helped transform the city from a manufacturing and meat-packing hub into a global financial-services capital.

But in the final years of his tenure, Mr. Daley wasn't as successful at fiscal management, said Laurence Msall, president of the Civic Federation, a business-funded government watchdog organization. The city's budget shortfall increased to $654.8 million in fiscal 2011 from $94.8 million in fiscal 2007, according to a report by the federation. Spending climbed 8% over the period even as revenues sank.

To cover the difference, Mr. Daley sold or leased such public assets as toll roads, parking meters and parking garages. In 2010, one-time revenue fixes covered 17% of the budget and all three major credit-rating firms cut the city's bond rating. To appease labor leaders as he pursued an ultimately failed bid for the 2016 Summer Olympics, Mr. Daley signed more than 30 union contracts that promised workers annual raises of as much as 3.5% through 2017.

The contracts also protected some comically inefficient separations of responsibility that require, for example, three workers to change the bulb on a street light—a driver, a laborer and an electrician—and two workers to run a power washer while removing graffiti.



In one deal, only Teamsters are allowed to drive most city trucks—and driving is all they are required to do, prompting complaints from citizens who see drivers sleeping or loafing in their vehicles at job sites.

Dick Simpson, a former alderman and chairman of the political science department of the University of Illinois at Chicago, released a study this year of waste, theft, patronage, nepotism and contract rigging that estimated such behavior costs residents close to $350 million a year, a figure based on city reports and court cases over the past two decades.

After Mr. Daley announced he wouldn't run for a seventh term as mayor, Mr. Emanuel, a former Illinois congressman and onetime fund-raiser for Mr. Daley, pledged to return from his White House job to dismantle the political machine he once worked for. Nearly all of the city's unions backed Mr. Emanuel's opponents, but he still won with 55% of the vote.

On Wednesday, after a frenetic five months in office, Mr. Emanuel released his proposed 2012 city budget, which included $20 million in estimated savings through creation of more efficient trash collection routes. It was unclear how many jobs would be cut.

"The current system, based on ward boundaries, is no longer sustrightble," Mr. Emanuel said. "Chicago spends approximately $100 more per ton to collect garbage than L.A. and Boston. Now, I have a lot of pride in Chicago. But even I don't think our garbage is more valuable than theirs."

City unions remain wary. "The jury is still out. A lot of these ideas seem fine until you find out what is going into them," said Jorge Ramirez, president of the Chicago Federation of Labor, which represents 320 public and private unions. "He got elected on strong management. So manage."

Mr. Emanuel said in an interview that he would make the garbage-collection system more efficient, while appeasing elected officials who could stand in his way.

"The days of having trash pickup by political design only are over," he said. The mayor acknowledged that changing the system would be historic. "It's a culture and a mindset...of 50 years," he said.

The big problem with Chicago is that it doesn't have one system serving its 600,000 households. It has 50.

Each of the city's 50 wards—including many oddly shaped crescents, slivers and L-shaped neighborhoods created by years of gerrymandering—is its own garbage district with its own bureaucracy, equipment, laborers and drivers.

"Chicago is absolutely unique in this country because it's based on a system whose boundaries are established for political reasons and have no relationship to route efficiency," said Chaz Miller, a director for the National Solid Waste Management Association, which represents private waste haulers and recyclers. "It makes it impossible to take advantage of an economy of scale."

The higher costs don't end there. Unlike nearly every other U.S. city, Chicago assigns three workers to most trucks instead of one or two.

Chicago has an absentee rate of nearly 30% among segments of the city labor force, according to Mr. Emanuel. And when on the job, garbage laborers work an average of 5½ hours per eight-hour shift, according to a 2008 investigation by the city inspector general's office.

The result is that city residents pay about three times as much for trash removal as do residents in Dallas, Phoenix, Miami, San Diego and Houston, and nearly twice as much as Los Angeles residents.

By switching to a more efficient grid system and dropping to one laborer and one driver per truck, the city could do the same job with 25% fewer workers and save $40 million, said Joseph Ferguson, the city's inspector general.

"There is a significant cost to that old system," Mr. Ferguson said. "It's an anachronism dating back to the old ward-heeler, patronage-based operation."

The boundaries in ward 30—where Mr. Squalls, the Teamster, works—are a prime example.

A decade ago, the last time the City Council redrew ward boundaries, neighboring aldermen appropriated portions of the 30th ward, leaving it shaped like a horseshoe, said Ariel Reboyras, the ward's current alderman.

The ward, a string of working class Latino and Polish neighborhoods on the northwest side of the city, is three miles long but narrows to as thin as two blocks in some stretches. A dogleg in the southwest corner was carved out to incorporate the home of a political opponent whom the other, adjoining aldermen didn't want to deal with.

"It's crazy," Mr. Reboyras said of the boundaries. "Totally nuts."

Beyond the irregular shapes, inefficiencies creep up because aldermen seek to maintain long-established pickup days. Garbage trucks often travel down alleys that switch from one ward to the next and back, each one with different trash schedules.

On a recent morning, a Ward 30 truck drove to the Hermosa neighborhood of two- and three-family brick homes. After collecting trash from a single block, the three-man crew drove four more blocks, through an adjacent ward, before re-entering Ward 30 to continue working.

Given their orders, Mr. Reboyras said, garbage workers are as efficient as possible. "These guys have it down to a science," he said.

Elected to three terms, most recently with 75% of the vote, Mr. Reboyras defended the ward-based trash system. Because he appoints the ward superintendent who directs the trucks, he can oblige residents who call for a special pick up. These so-called specials are part of his electoral success and he logs each one—whether for trash, rodent control or street sweeping— in a black three-ring binder. In a typical month, he sends trucks on more than 300 special trash pickups.

Revamping the city's collection system—centralizing service and cutting aldermen out of the loop—would strip officials like Mr. Reboyras of key powers. That threat raises the possibility of a rare and potentially embarrassing veto by the City Council if Mr. Emanuel moves to remake city trash services.

Mr. Reboyras said wholesale changes would mean worse service and layoffs. "We're in the middle of a recession," he said. "Where do you think these guys will go?"

Mr. Emanuel said it was too early to talk about job cuts. He plans to create a grid but not cut the authority of aldermen entirely. "They still have a service role," he said. "Because you're planning on picking up garbage—like UPS—on a more efficient model, doesn't mean their responsibilities to their constituents are evaporated."

Perry Brown, a 63-year-old city laborer with a neatly trimmed white beard and an 11th-grade education, said he doubted he could find another $32-an-hour job if he were cut. He earns about $90,000 a year in salary and benefits, enough to send two of his three children through college and buy a three-bedroom home.

Tough talk against city laborers is usually voiced by sedentary bureaucrats with soft hands, he said: "We work harder than any of them."

On a recent work day, Mr. Brown left home before dawn in a new white Cadillac. Once at the ward sanitation yard, he ate breakfast—a bologna sandwich—and changed into work clothes. On a typical day, he'll endure bad smells, leaky garbage bags, rodents, dead animals and, depending on the season, searing heat or driving snow.

"It's a nasty job," he said, "but it's the best paying job I've ever had."

[rocky_warrior]

$70k to start, and they work 5 1/2 hours a day.  $90k with seniority (see Perry Brown near the bottom).

This is the quintessential article that shows what is wrong with Chicago and why it is going bankrupt.

Oy...misquoting.  $70k was after having the job for 25 years!  How is that "to start"

As for the $90k figure, that's "salary and benefits" - which probably means $70k salary. 
http://money.cnn.com/2013/02/28/smallbusiness/salary-benefits/

But anyhow, for the cubbies sake I hope this dude wins!

[warriorchick]

In my suburb, there is only one guy per truck.  He drives it, pulls up to the cans, gets out, dumps the cans into the truck, gets back in the cab, and drives to the next house.

It's outsourced, and our village puts the service out for bid every few years to make sure we get the best service at the most reasonable price.  We pay the garbage company directly (About $16/month) but I am sure it is way less than whatever I would get charged in taxes in the city.

[Coleman]

In my suburb, there is only one guy per truck.  He drives it, pulls up to the cans, gets out, dumps the cans into the truck, gets back in the cab, and drives to the next house.

It's outsourced, and our village puts the service out for bid every few years to make sure we get the best service at the most reasonable price.  We pay the garbage company directly (About $16/month) but I am sure it is way less than whatever I would get charged in taxes in the city.

Not sure where you live but property taxes are actually way less in the city than in most burbs. I have coworkers who pay twice what I do in property taxes for a similarly priced home in the NW burbs.

Now, the schools are better in the burbs, but I could pay for private school and still come out ahead with the difference in property taxes.

[brandx]

Fake ticket

My first thought as well.

But if we have learned anything on Scoop, it is that Heisy believes pretty much everything he reads on the web. In another thread, he uses Jim Cramer as as expert. An insider who didn't know about the crash 12 hours ahead of time is truly someone we should use for our investment advice. Sadly, for us, he posts almost all of it.

[buckchuckler]

Not sure where you live but property taxes are actually way less in the city than in most burbs. I have coworkers who pay twice what I do in property taxes for a similarly priced home in the NW burbs.

Now, the schools are better in the burbs, but I could pay for private school and still come out ahead with the difference in property taxes.

Seems fishy.  The tuition for St. Ignatius, (private high school) is over 17k.  Loyola is the same.  De Le Salle, Brother Rice, Marist and Leo are about 11k. I have a hard time believing the property taxes are that much different. 

The property taxes all throughout Illinois are ridiculous, as with most things, among the worst in the country. 

[warriorchick]

Not sure where you live but property taxes are actually way less in the city than in most burbs. I have coworkers who pay twice what I do in property taxes for a similarly priced home in the NW burbs.

Now, the schools are better in the burbs, but I could pay for private school and still come out ahead with the difference in property taxes.

My point is that the amount of tax money spent on garbage collection in Chicago is likely to be much more on a per-household basis than what the garbage company charges me.

Also, my taxes may be more, but my village's budget is balanced, so there.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Hoax