***UPDATE: The Mega Millions Jackpot is now up to $1.28 BILLION dollars. Cash option now at $747.2 MILLION, so the numbers in the article will be off, but you get the picture.
At the time of writing this, the Mega Millions for 7/29 is at $1.1 BILLION dollars! And it’s likely still going up.
Every single one of us is guilty of daydreaming about how nice it would be to win the lottery, what we would buy, where we would go, who we would give money to, yada yada yada. The struggle of the average hard-working person is real! That very well may change for one (or more) lucky winners tonight.
However, 1.1 billion dollars sounds insane and you might be thinking, “Wow! If I win, I’ll become an instant billionaire!”
Welllllll… kind of, but not really. Let me explain what happens to your money if you happen to win tonight’s jackpot.
Since the current Mega Millions jackpot is now at $1,100,000,000, you need to decide if you want the installment payments or the cash option. The cash-out option would be $648.2 million. The installments option would play out like this: the winner will receive 30 payments spread out over 29 years. Most people take the cash option.
Now, $648,200,000 is nothing to scoff at and definitely enough money to do anything you want for the rest of your life, but it’s about half of what you already won. We’re not done yet.
Now’s about the time our good friend Uncle Sam comes knocking at the door. The IRS instantly will take out 24% of what’s left. That’s about $144.6 million. Don’t worry, you still owe a lot of money.
Eventually, tax season comes around and now you have to pay taxes on your winnings. I know, didn’t we already pay taxes on it? 🤔 That’ll cost you about another $80 million. Next up, you’ll have to pay state tax on that as well. When all is said and done you’re looking at about $380 million dollars (37.5% of the total jackpot) to chill in your bank account. (or get blown right away)
I am by NO means trying to be a Debbie Downer, I hope to high hell that I win! $380 million dollars after taxes is still an unfathomable amount of life-altering amount of money, it just isn’t a billion dollars. It would be incredibly hard to spend that much money in a lifetime. It’s been done, though. Looking at you MC Hammer, Mike Tyson, and a stupidly large percentage of lottery winners. In fact, for many, many, many lottery winners claim that winning the lottery is the worst thing that happened to them. They spend too much and go broke, they give away too much from cockroaches climbing out of the woodwork, they get scammed & people rip them off, they are targets of kidnapping, burglary, and even murder.
Okay, I’m really not trying to be a Negative Nancy here 🤣
Cheers, and good luck!
