PHOTO BY BOB ROCHE
Not even the lottery signs were prepared to handle the prize of more than a billion dollars.
BY GAYLA CAWLEY
As the Powerball jackpot for Wednesday night’s drawing continues to rise — it is now estimated to be a record $1.4 billion — lottery players from coast to coast are fantasizing about what could be done with that kind of money.
If a winner should want his or her money upfront rather than in installments over 30 years, that amount will be slashed to a paltry $868 million before taxes.
If a Massachusetts resident should defy the one in 292 million odds of taking home the top prize, they would be on the hook to pay 30 percent of those winnings to Uncle Sam (25 percent to the federal government and 5 percent to the state). Their take home payday on the cash option would be a check for about $607 million.
So what exactly could that buy?
For a winner who is into luxury cars, $607 million could buy 1,233 new 2016 Rolls Royce Phantom Coupes, which are valued at approximately $492,000. Of course, with that amount of money, the garage may be spacious with plenty of room for 1,844 of the more affordable 2016 Rolls Royce Ghost, valued at about $329,000.
A near-billionaire might not want to drive anymore and instead choose to travel by plane — and might not want to fly with the masses. With $607 million, the winner could buy a Boeing 747-8 plane, which sell for approximately $379 million and still have $228 million in petty cash with which to travel the world.
Newly-minted millionaires get hungry just like the rest of us. With the newfound fortune, a winner could buy well over 152 million McDonald’s Big Macs. If he or she wanted to upgrade that Big Mac to a meal, that would still buy well over 101 million meals.
Three former executive directors of the Massachusetts State Lottery, two of whom hailed in Lynn and one from Nahant, talked about how this exciting jackpot could be a huge boon for a lucky winner, but could also have consequences on the lottery industry particular cause a phenomenon known as “jackpot fatigue.”
Lynn resident Beth Bresnahan, former executive director of the Massachusetts State Lottery and current CEO of the Daily Item, said that each time a jackpot reaches a mega-level it causes players to become less and less excited by jackpots that they’ve seen before.
Bresnahan, who was with the state lottery for nearly eight years and served as executive director from January 2014 to to July 2015, said it’s hard to get people, especially those who don’t play the lottery very often, excited about a jackpot that isn’t over a certain amount. She said that amount, or threshold for excitement, was $100 million about 10 years ago and over time grew to $350 million or $400 million. She said some casual players even cite $500 million as not enough of a driver to get them to buy a $2 ticket. With the jackpot now exceeding $1 billion, she said that amount which generates excitement is likely to rise again.
“Now that the jackpot has exceeded that seven-figure mark, the public’s expectations for wild jackpots will continue to grow,” Bresnahan said.
When the Massachusetts Lottery sold its first ticket in 1973, Bresnahan said a $1 million winner would draw national media attention. Now, she said the lottery awards at least two to three $1 million winners a week. Now, she said, that newsworthy dollar amount would be in the double-digit millions.
Lynn resident Mark Cavanagh, former executive director of the Massachusetts State Lottery and current finance director for the city of Quincy, said he’s also seen people wait it out for bigger jackpots.
“The whole concept of what kind of money would make a difference in a person’s life was always amusing to me,” Cavanagh said.
Cavanagh said he was with the lottery from 2007 to 2011 and was there when the Powerball was introduced to Massachusetts players in 2010. He said the minimal jackpot when Powerball debuted in the state was $12 million, which would have been a life changing amount for any winner. He said he found it strange when he’d hear people saying they were waiting it out until it reached at least $50 million.
In 2010, Cavanagh said an agreement was struck to cross-sell the industry’s multi-state jackpot games Powerball and Mega Millions in new jurisdictions. At the time, 33 smaller states offered Powerball and 12 of the larger states, including Massachusetts, sold Mega Millions.
Cavanagh was instrumental in that negotiation.
Cavanagh said he heard that should there be a single winner of Wednesday night’s jackpot, he or she would jump to No. 50 on the Forbes 100, which lists the wealthiest people in the world.
Former Nahant resident Jim Hosker was executive director of the Massachusetts State Lottery from 1983 to 1989. During his tenure, he said lottery officials were afraid of jackpots getting out of hand.
Hosker, who now lives in Mansfield, said bigger jackpots have yet to hurt the lottery, but they eventually will. In the last drawing, Hosker said 75 percent of the different number combinations that could have been selected in Saturday night’s drawing for $900 million were covered. Bresnahan also spoke about that number.
“There was approximately a 75 percent chance that somebody would have won the jackpot based on the total number of combinations played by ticket holders across the country,” Bresnahan said.
The jackpot was last hit on Nov. 4 and has been growing for 19 consecutive drawings. The former record was a $656 million Mega Millions jackpot that was split between three winners in the March 30, 2012 drawing. Powerball’s previous record was $590.5 million, won on May 18, 2013, according to a release from the state lottery.
If no one wins the jackpot in Wednesday night’s drawing, it is not yet known what the top prize might grow to. But for sure, players will be able to add much more to their list of fantasy items.
