I would do a lot for $1.6 billion. Like, a lot.
Did I buy a lottery ticket? No. Should I have bought a ticket? Probably not. Do I regret my failure to purchase a minuscule chance to win this enormous jackpot? Absolutely. Sorry, Mom.
In Powerball, people pick numbers in a sequence. Five numbered white balls and one numbered Powerball are drawn. If you pick all of the correct numbers, you win the jackpot. People can win smaller prizes of smaller cash values. Simple game, big reward. In October, the organization increased the number of possible white balls to 69 and the number of red balls to 26. Powerball’s changes actually decreased the chance to win the big jackpot and increased the size of main prize. People are more likely to get struck by lightening or flattened by a rouge cow than win the lottery. In fact, The Economist reported that buyers are more likely to get hit by an asteroid than win the lottery.
On top of the astoundingly low likelihood of bringing home the bug bucks, many people lose a lot of money to the game. Even though each wager is two dollars, those bets can add up in a frenzied scramble at a local 7-eleven.
While there is something spectacularly devious about the lottery, the gambler inside my brain sees something kind of beautiful about the idea of Powerball. Two dollars could theoretically turn into over one billion dollars. If I apply some of that stuff I learned in Chemistry about significant figures, I know have no chance at winning the jackpot. Zero percent. Even if I bought a handful of bets, I’d have a zero percent change of winning. I might as well spend that money on a gas station churro or something.
But that two dollars is kind of fantastic. Despite the low odds, people still bet their money. Usually a small amount, yes, but still an amount. People in this country seem to have this internal hope at winning the game, and no matter how unlikely the victory, they still hand over their two bucks. Why? Perhaps humans want to feel part of something larger than their own selves and take part in something that seems so much larger than their own lives. Perhaps people have a twisted obsession with this game of low odds because of the tiny adrenaline high they feel when they pick those six numbers on the wager.
Whatever the case, this small bit of hope that people have seems trivial, but it also says something very powerful. It seems as if there is some kind of human resilience in situations of guaranteed failure. Maybe not even resilience but a complete leap into a pool with no water. The repercussions aren’t that bad, maybe a few bruises and a few bucks missing from a wallet. There also really isn’t any incentive to bet in the first place, and I think most people who participate in Powerball understand the low odds.
So why jump? Why throw away two bucks? Why participate in a game that falsely advertises a significant chance at a prize?
Why not?
Kate Mcginn
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