Mega Millions announces single winner for $450M jackpot

[Hamartia Antidote]

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mega-millions-winning-numbers-january-5-2018-jackpot-450million/

One lucky Mega Millions ticket holder in Florida has won a $450 million jackpot after matching all six numbers in the prize. Choosing the cash option would bring home $281 million.

The winning numbers drawn Friday just after 11 p.m. Eastern time were 28, 30, 39, 59, 70 and Gold Mega Ball 10. It is the fourth-largest jackpot in the 15 year history of Mega Millions and the 10th largest prize in any U.S lottery.

A total of eight Match 5 winning tickets also were sold in Friday's drawing -- one each in California, Massachusetts, Tennessee and Virginia, and two each in Oklahoma and Texas. More than 21 million tickets were sold for all the prizes.

The Mega Millions jackpot now resets to its starting amount of $40 million ($25 million cash) for the next drawing on January 9.

Powerball jackpot jumps to $570 million
Lottery officials also increased the jackpot of Powerball, the other national lottery game, to $570 million. That drawing is Saturday night.

The jackpots refer to the annuity options for both games, in which payments are made over 29 years. Most winners opt for cash options, which would be $358.5 million for Powerball.

Ahead of the drawing, Mega Millions players rushed out to snap up tickets, some in areas facing frigid temperatures after a Northeast snowstorm.

 

[KAL-EL]

Would take the lump sum cash option without a single doubt.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Would take the lump sum cash option without a single doubt.

yep, although if you picked the annuity you could sell it to a financial company for more than the $281M lump sum payout. Depends upon how much is the hassle worth.

 

[graphican]

Americans are spending $70 Billion dollars per annum on lottery and get rich schemes. If winner's prize is $570 millions, it is less than 0.08% of what people end up wasting in hope of winning. Imagine who's winning 99.92% of it every year.

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/05/lotteries-americas-70-billion-shame/392870/

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Americans are spending $70 Billion dollars per annum on lottery and get rich schemes. If winner's prize is $570 millions, it is less than 0.08% of what people end up wasting in hope of winning. Imagine who's winning 99.92% of it every year.

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/05/lotteries-americas-70-billion-shame/392870/

The money is used by the states for things like education.
I'd rather somebody give the state a few bucks than having that person buy a pack of cigarettes.

Edit: looks like the article mentions the same thing

 

[graphican]

The money is used by the states for things like education.
I'd rather somebody give the state a few bucks than having that person buy a pack of cigarettes.

Bad strategy. What else do you think state should do to earn money? How about selling alcohol or drugs? State has its legitimate means of earning money, that is called tax. It is unimaginable that state would depend on gambling sums to offer welfare services like education.

And I am really thinking; what is wrong with America? When did it break as a state?

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Bad strategy. What else do you think state should do to earn money? How about selling alcohol or drugs? State has its legitimate means of earning money, that is called tax. It is unimaginable that state would depend on gambling sums to offer welfare services like education.

And I am really thinking; what is wrong with America? When did it break as a state?

It is well-known the lottery exists to raise money for the local governments. This isn't a mystery. Plus Alcohol, cigarettes, and gambling (illegal in many states BTW) also have a "sin" tax.
http://www.governing.com/gov-data/finance/state-sin-tax-collections-revenues.html#

I'm in Massachusetts. These numbers can be misleading due to huge population differences. For instance Massachusetts has 6x the population of Rhode Island. So the total would be much higher.

I used to work in a supermarket that sold lottery tickets in a low-mid income section of Boston. By far most people would buy only one ticket.

However there are other lottery games other than powerball and megamillions which I would question the morality of it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keno should be outright banned as that is the game the poor play since it has multiple drawings day/hour while the above two are twice a week, scratch tickets too )