5 reasons you don’t want to win the Powerball jackpot

There’s no way of telling how many people might lay claim to an $800-million Powerball jackpot Saturday night, but lottery officials insist that Califonia schools will be among the winners. With Powerball sales doubling previous records, the odds are growing that someone will win Saturday¿s $800 million jackpot, but if no one matches all the lottery numbers, next week¿s drawing is expected to soar past $1 billion.

Chandi Group USA, which owns many gas stations across the valley, said its stores are seeing record sales. If a victor doesn’t have such a number – yes, non-citizens can win the lottery – the IRS withholding rate is 28 percent.

“Once you get numbers that size, it’s hard for people to wrap their minds around them”, Wasserstein said. A single victor of Saturday’s draw would get about $299.6 million as a lump sum. From here, it’s all about location.

The New Mexico Lottery said, after taxes, the $800 million jackpot would come to about $342 million.

“Picking one lucky penny out of a stack of pennies the height of the Empire State Building, would still be 1,000 times more likely” than winning the Powerball, he said. “Concentrate on the numbers and ask the universe to bring you the numbers in order and write them down as they come”, Mouser said. Those tax percentages can vary anywhere from 3 percent in New Jersey to nearly 9 percent in NY or Maryland.

Myisha Polk, who sold Bayiye the ticket, said her day had been hectic.

Watch the Powerball drawing live Saturday on Channel 2 right before the Channel 2 Action News Nightbeat at 11.

Powerball is played in 44 states and three USA territories. Five states besides Hawaii – Alaska, Alabama, Nevada, Mississippi and Utah – do not participate.

The people at Powerball say between 70 to 80 percent of purchases are computer picks and between 70 to 80 percent of winners are computer picks, which is about what you’d expect. But giving money to relatives or leaving it as part of an estate may present the opposite problem, eating up even more of the money in estate, inheritance or gift taxes. The jackpot amount of $800 million is the annuitized amount, so if you want all of your money at once, a lump-sum payment will be based on the cash value of the jackpot which is now $496 million.

However, if you miss the live drawing, the app – created by Shoutz, Inc. – will notify you if you won the jackpot or one of the many non-jackpot prizes offered in the Powerball lottery game.

Remember, it only takes one ticket to win.