It serms incredible to me to give over a billion dollars to a random person.
In the US, close to half of the winnings do go to the lottery, plus a portion of each lottery ticket usually goes to fund some government agency. Schools, programs for the impoverished and disenfranchised, etc.
The real question, in my opinion, is if you are willing to spend that much money on a ticket, why aren’t you willing to spend that much money on just outright funding government programs? Imagine if 100% of what someone paid for a ticket went to programs for the disenfranchised? That could make real difference.
I spend about $10 per year on lottery tickets. I pay upwards of $40k in taxes, much of which is funneled to “disenfranchised”. I’m good, thanks.
Ok, but if you had a guarantee that your $10 would go directly to the disenfranchised with no chances of returning millions to you, how would that change things?
That depends on the government in question. For example, the Canadian government does not have a claim on any kind of lottery or game show winnings.
To my understanding, and a quick Google search, winnings are never taxed.
