“Inside the Industry”

By: Paul Davis Restoration of Central PA

May the Odds be Ever in our Favor

As the chants of “I believe that we will win” ended abruptly last night with the heart stopping last second goal by Portugal, Futbol fans everywhere where shocked and sick to their stomachs. I got to thinking, now what are our chances of advancing to the round of 16, of winning the World Cup?

I know the U.S. chances of winning the World Cup are better than visiting the emergency room from a golf cart accident with the odds of that happening at 1 in 22,355 and even better than an NFL kickoff being returned for a touchdown, occurring 1 in 270 times. For all you American Football Fans who can’t wait for September, let’s cheer on the U.S.A and hope the odds are in our favor!

When you think about property disasters the odds are even less in our favor. It is 40% more likely that you will report or have reported property loss due to water damage. When 23% of all reported property loss is accounted for by water damage and the chances of the U.S. beating Germany are 8.7% you know we need a miracle. The chance of your home being destroyed by a fire (1 in 10) is more likely to happen than the U.S. winning Group G at 1 in 11.

The odds of an American motorist colliding with a deer are 1 in 174 for the year of 2013. Americans have a better chance of colliding with a deer than winning the World Cup, but did we already suspect this? If anyone actually put any thought into this statement, I bet most of them would tell you, “Ya, that seams about right”. Especially anyone who lives in Pennsylvania, as we are the undisputed leader in the number of deer-vehicle crashed according the Insurance giant State Farm.

There is a silver-lining to all of these statistics, the U.S.A Soccer Team has a 49% chance of qualifying from Group G and that is better than the chance that the President of the United States attended Harvard, and significantly better than the percentage of total catastrophe losses combined from winter storms, terrorism, earthquakes, wind/hail/flood and fire according to the Insurance Information Institute from 1993-2012.

So what does all this mean? Our chances of beating Germany are 1 in 11.5, the odds of tying are 1 in 4 (we will take it!), and finally the odds of the U.S.A winning the world cup are 1 in 201. In case you still haven’t got it, the odds are not in our country’s favor, the odds are stacked against us, but “we believe that we will win!” is the chant that will be heard round the world on Thursday June 26th at 12:00pm. Watch the game and do your best to even out the odds!

Sources: Book of Odds by: Amram Shapiro, blog Free by 50, State Farm Insurance, Insurance Information Institute & worldcupodds.com