Apparently there are problems in security in the Powerball system that has delayed the draw of the 1.9 Billion jackpot.
At this prize level it seems it would be worth buying every combination. According to one source this would be $584,402,676. You'd win the jackpot plus have thousand of tickets at the consolation levels. All your losing tickets will go against the tax gain. Maybe someone is trying this.
One other person hits and you are screwed though, cash option is about $970M so half of that is $485M. Besides you would probably need multiple machines running 24 hours for days to get all the tickets, not enough time to get it done.
Ya--you'd prob break about even if you have to split it in 2 but you'll lose if 3 or more. Regarding the machine, ya, thats too crazy--someones got to go through all the tickets to get the winners etc. Guess its impractical if you can't just place the bet directly with the lottery.
I've seen an estimate that a person can fill out about 43 tickets per hour (https://www.businessinsider.com/mega-millions-lottery-buying-every-ticket-math-2018-10 - it's for Mega Millions, but presumably Powerball would be similar). That means that it would take close to 7,000,000 hours to buy all of the tickets. With the game being played 3 times per week, it would take a consortium of about 300,000 people working 12 hours a day between drawings to cover the numbers, and presumably they would want a cut too! (Even at $15 an hour that would cost more than $100 million.)
yeah of course.... but that kinda cash could change the lives of ALOT of people if there were several winners, instead of 1 person with more money than they can spend in a lifetime. Yeah I sound like a hippy, so what...
Ya--there needs to be a direct betting option which allows for all combos--no need to actually print tickets. If this was availablLE the hypothetical investment of $585 million would include the jackpot plus: $68 million for 5 balls w/out powerball Apparently just picking the 1/26 powerball gets you $4. 290 million combos means you'll hit that about 11 million times = $44 million. For each tkt matching 4 balls w/out powerball you get $100. I don't know how many combos you'd have but its a lot. Then there's payoff for other combos. So the payoffs absent the jackpot are all calculable prior to the drawing and looks like at least $150 million to which you'd add the jackpot value.
That would suck. It would ruin the point of a lottery and make it just another investment for billionaires
Ya--philosophical question--what do you think the point of the lottery is? @abyzmul --I'd like to hear your opinion on this too if you don't mind.
But you would still have to print out every ticket, a machine spitting out a ticket every second would take over 9 years to print them all. Problem is the machines do not run 24 hours as far as I am aware. I think they run about 16 out of 24 hours so that probably ups it to 12 years to print them all, not sure how many machines it would take to get them done. Of course that would tie up thousands of machines meaning the prize would be a larger percentage of your own money.
Ya--no question it can't be done printing tickets and I think we're pretty sure if you went to the lottery officials and offered to lay down 585 million on every combo (no need to print tickets) they wouldn't accept it.
The point of the lottery is to make money for the states from people who don't understand basic probability and statistics. As I always tell my students, "Lotteries are a tax on people who failed statistics." Play for entertainment, play because you need a lot of money right away and don't want to mug someone to get it, but don't play because you think it's a good deal - the states keep half of the money that is bet.
Are you expecting me to go conspiracy on this one? It is people having a little fantasy about instant millions for no work or effort other than a 2 dollar ticket. Nobody is being tricked unless it's their first time playing. You don't need to participate, and the astronomical odds are well-publicized, so it's not really a scam or anything like that. It's just another distraction from the mundane. A big shiny one.
