Powerball Lottery Rises Again to Record $1.5 Billion: What the Lucky Winners Should Not Do!

Investing

Published: January 12, 2016 12:20 pm

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 3:08 pm

The Powerball lottery jackpot is really getting out of hand. After having moved to a U.S. record of $900 million up to $1.3 billion, and then to $1.4 billion, now the Powerball jackpot has hit an unbelievable sum of $1.5 billion!

The lottery now probably has replaced hard work and risk as the new American Dream. Why work so hard if you can just spend a few bucks and become worth tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars? Most people who put their mind to it can get wealthy, but amassing tens or hundreds of millions of dollars is extremely rare.

Before you imagine what a $1.5 billion winning can do, there are some additional things to consider. First, that is the annuity value — the cash payout value is $930 million, and that is a pretax number. What is happening here is that the volume of ticket purchases has reached more than just record levels. We have never before seen such a rapid rise in the value of a single jackpot.

But then there is another consideration . What if you actually win this $1.5 billion jackpot? Tens of millions might be thinking about it, but one or a few people actually should win. Now consider that coming into tens or hundreds of millions of dollars all at once comes with responsibility, as well as with many pitfalls and dangers. Because this is empire-making money, 24/7 Wall St. has created a guide for 12 things not to do if you win the lottery.

Empires have crumbled all through history. Many will crumble in the generations ahead. And most lottery winners are statistically considered broke within just a few years. 24/7 Wall St. wants to help lottery winners not be the brunt of every family joke for many years ahead. Can you imagine how you would feel if you won $100 million (or $930 million, pretax) and then ending up broke?

Even if you don’t play the lottery, this lesson matters. There are few multi-millionaires who got rich from the lottery and stayed rich. But there are many who won a legal judgment or unexpectedly inherited money. And there are many who sell a business and suddenly come into millions of dollars.