Mega Millions is now up to $640 million

4,024 Views | 31 Replies | Last: 14 yr ago by Phantomfan
TouchedTheAxeIn82
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Oh yeah.




BTW, this is not OT because when I win, you'll soon see the TTAI82 Center for Something or Other on campus.
MilleniaBear
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Maybe the ATO can buy a MegaMillions ticket and use the winnings to pay for the stadium renovations...
beeasyed
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hahah i've already thought what i'd do w/ the money as well. although if you take it as a one-time lump sum, post-tax, you're lookin around 290 million (for the 540m lotto). yup, Cal would see 50m from me :bear:
Cal Geek
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Maybe I could buy the rest of the ESP tickets....
and then....I wonder how many of the unsold tickets around the stadium I could buy...only 20?
68great
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TouchedTheAxeIn82;731546 said:

Oh yeah.




BTW, this is not OT because when I win, you'll soon see the TTAI82 Center for Something or Other on campus.


So should I take the $$ I was going to use to buy my Cal season ticket and take a chance on the lottery????

Or should I take the $1.00 I was going to give to the homeless guy on the corner and buy a lottery ticket???
ColoradoBear
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So any one out there have $175,711,536 sitting around? Buy every number possible, lump sum is $460 million. An easy $285 million right? some risk of having to split though...
okaydo
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I would use the money to build a gold statue of Sandy Barbour and Jeff Tedford at the entrance of Memorial Stadium.
KoreAmBear
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okaydo;731592 said:

I would use the money to build a gold statue of Sandy Barbour and Jeff Tedford at the entrance of Memorial Stadium.


I'd use it to make a gold statue of Tosh playing XBox inside Ludwig's fountain.
Cal Geek
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ColoradoBear1;731574 said:

So any one out there have $175,711,536 sitting around? Buy every number possible, lump sum is $460 million. An easy $285 million right? some risk of having to split though...


I wonder how long it would take to fill out 175,711,536 tickets?

Lets see, even if you didn't sleep or eat for 24 hours, and it took 1 second to fill out each on (a bit of an underestimate in my opinion), it would take 5.57 years to fill out the tickets.
socaltownie
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ride525;731606 said:

I wonder how long it would take to fill out 175,711,536 tickets?

Lets see, even if you didn't sleep or eat for 24 hours, and it took 1 second to fill out each on (a bit of an underestimate in my opinion), it would take 5.57 years to fill out the tickets.


It also becomes a horrid proposition if you SPLIT the winnings. It is ALWAYS a negative expectation game
Bear8
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A hard working guy came by the office. He doesn't make much money. He seems happy with his life, although you never know. He mentioned that he bought a lottery ticket because the amount is so large.

I said to him, "I guess when the lottery was only $2 million that wasn't enough for you?"

The odds of winning are so remote as to make the whole process a joke. The only redeeming factor is that a large portion will be given to our schools.......we hope. I recall some sort of scandal where the administration of the lottery takes a large chunk before disbursement to the educational entities get anything. I suppose some money is better than none, particularly when you're recovering from a recession.
bearister
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LafayetteBear;731563 said:

I'm in. Or, rather, my wife is in, via a pool with some of her office mates. I'm not holding my breath, but as Lloyd Christmas would say, "There's a chance." LOL....


Phone call between LafayetteBear and his wife:

Wife: "You can start packing, our office just won the $600 million."

LB: "How exciting! What should I pack? Cold weather clothes for a ski trip to Switzerland or warm weather clothes for a Tahitian holiday?

Wife: "I don't care what you pack, just be out of the house with all of your crap by the time I get home from work."
Cal Geek
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bearister;731623 said:

Phone call between LafayetteBear and his wife:

Wife: "You can start packing, our office just won the $600 million."

LB: "How exciting! What should I pack? Cold weather clothes for a ski trip to Switzerland or warm weather clothes for a Tahitian holiday?

Wife: "I don't care what you pack, just be out of the house with all of your crap by the time I get home from work."
Best post of the day!!!!!!
pingpong2
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socaltownie;731615 said:

It also becomes a horrid proposition if you SPLIT the winnings. It is ALWAYS a negative expectation game


In the past it has always been a negative expectation game, but that isn't to say there is no jackpot large enough to make it positive.
CalBearRJ
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KoreAmBear;731601 said:

I'd use it to make a gold statue of Tosh playing XBox inside Ludwig's fountain.


Not a bad idea, but I'd put it under the Manneken Pis.
burritos
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bearister;731623 said:

phone call between lafayettebear and his wife:

Wife: "you can start packing, our office just won the $600 million."

lb: "how exciting! What should i pack? Cold weather clothes for a ski trip to switzerland or warm weather clothes for a tahitian holiday?

Wife: "i don't care what you pack, just be out of the house with all of your crap by the time i get home from work."


omg!
Big C
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6bear6;731619 said:

A hard working guy came by the office. He doesn't make much money. He seems happy with his life, although you never know. He mentioned that he bought a lottery ticket because the amount is so large.

I said to him, "I guess when the lottery was only $2 million that wasn't enough for you?"

The odds of winning are so remote as to make the whole process a joke. The only redeeming factor is that a large portion will be given to our schools.......we hope. I recall some sort of scandal where the administration of the lottery takes a large chunk before disbursement to the educational entities get anything. I suppose some money is better than none, particularly when you're recovering from a recession.


Every little bit helps nowadays, I guess. but basically, the amount that schools end up with ain't jack. Plus, it usually gets offset by other budget cuts, quid pro quo, and that started in about Year One of the California Lottery.

Hey, some colleagues and I went in on a chunk of tickets: It's worth the price in dreams and water cooler conversation.

However, what's really sad are the people who don't understand that it's a fools' game. I remember once, years back, when the CA lottery was at some all-time high, some poor down-on-his-luck bastard mortgaged what was left on his house (or something like that) and spent it all on lottery tickets, with the logic being that he increased his chances of winning by 20,000 fold, over just buying one ticket. Stories like that are painful...

I used to be okay with state-sponsored gambling. I never did (and still don't) buy the counter-argument that "it's a tax on the poor". However, when I look at the poor slobs that gamble a lot, it's just so sad that I don't think government ought to be in that business.

And at the risk of highjacking the thread (and getting some people who have actually read this far to complain that it hasn't been moved to "OT")... Indian Gaming? For goodness sake, where do I start as to why that's a bad idea...
azulviejo
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bearister;731623 said:

Phone call between LafayetteBear and his wife:

Wife: "You can start packing, our office just won the $600 million."

LB: "How exciting! What should I pack? Cold weather clothes for a ski trip to Switzerland or warm weather clothes for a Tahitian holiday?

Wife: "I don't care what you pack, just be out of the house with all of your crap by the time I get home from work."


Sorry LB, but that was funny!:beer:
azulviejo
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KoreAmBear;731601 said:

I'd use it to make a gold statue of Tosh playing XBox inside Ludwig's fountain.


How about next to urinal row in Dwinelle?
GB54
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If I was Jerry Brown I'd be buying these like crazy
Valleyblue
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I heard from a friend at the Lottery Commission that as of early this afternoon, 95% of the possible number combinations have been sold, so a winner tonight is highly likely. I just hope it's mine. You can bet that Cal, both the athletic department and academics will be very happy.
FiatSlug
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God help us if there is no winning ticket sold for tonight's draw.

I can only imagine the insanity were tonight's jackpot to roll over to Tuesday night's draw. A jackpot of over $900MM would seem to be a foregone conclusion.
pingpong2
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Sigh, I did not win. However, 1 of the 20 tickets I had is good for $10.
ddc_Cal
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whether you play or not.
beeasyed
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pingpong2;731757 said:

Sigh, I did not win. However, 1 of the 20 tickets I had is good for $10.


i didn't have a single row w/ more than 1 number. bought 20 lines. lol.
calumnus
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ddc_Cal;731769 said:

whether you play or not.


But by buying a $1 ticket you increase your odds of winning by an infinite%!
CalBearS916Fan
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some lucky person in maryland won it all. congrats to them
bencgilmore
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ride525;731606 said:

I wonder how long it would take to fill out 175,711,536 tickets?

Lets see, even if you didn't sleep or eat for 24 hours, and it took 1 second to fill out each on (a bit of an underestimate in my opinion), it would take 5.57 years to fill out the tickets.


Sounds like the attitude of an underperformer if you ask me. :beer:
Phantomfan
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It seems to me that anyone who did not buy a ticket when the jackpot was that high was not playing the odds.


Maybe someone can correct me...




For example, in craps playing hard way when they payout is 30:1 is a bad bet. But if the payout was 90:1 it would be stupid not to play it.

Bottom line, $12 million is not enough to get me to play. $350 million+ is a good use of my $1.
pingpong2
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Phantomfan;732498 said:

It seems to me that anyone who did not buy a ticket when the jackpot was that high was not playing the odds.


Maybe someone can correct me...




For example, in craps playing hard way when they payout is 30:1 is a bad bet. But if the payout was 90:1 it would be stupid not to play it.

Bottom line, $12 million is not enough to get me to play. $350 million+ is a good use of my $1.


It's more complicated than just multiplying the payout with the probability of winning it because you can have multiple winners where the winnings are split. This ends up becoming a binomial probability problem that can be modeled using a Poisson distribution.
Phantomfan
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6bear6;731619 said:

A hard working guy came by the office. He doesn't make much money. He seems happy with his life, although you never know. He mentioned that he bought a lottery ticket because the amount is so large.

I said to him, "I guess when the lottery was only $2 million that wasn't enough for you?"

The odds of winning are so remote as to make the whole process a joke. The only redeeming factor is that a large portion will be given to our schools.......we hope. I recall some sort of scandal where the administration of the lottery takes a large chunk before disbursement to the educational entities get anything. I suppose some money is better than none, particularly when you're recovering from a recession.


The expected return on a $2 million drawing is about a half cent ($0.0068) after taxes (small game, so I assume a single winner).

At 640 million, the expected return on ~$1 is ~$1.10 (after taxes, split with multiple winners).

Last weeks drawing was maybe the only time in history that the odds were actually in his favor. No?
Phantomfan
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pingpong2;732501 said:

It's more complicated than just multiplying the payout with the probability of winning it because you can have multiple winners where the winnings are split. This ends up becoming a binomial probability problem that can be modeled using a Poisson distribution.


I agree...and I would still say it is a good use of a buck. I used simple terms because the argument (quoted in my second post) was that $2 million is the same as $640 million when the odds are so bad.



Maybe someone can actually model it and give us an actual amount where it is alright to play the lotto
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