The current Powerball jackpot has reached an estimated $747 million, and that staggering figure is part of a larger trend.
Every time there’s a Powerball draw and nobody wins the jackpot, the jackpot grows. The harder it is to win, the bigger that jackpot will get. There are Powerball drawings every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday. Like Powerball, you win $1 million by matching all five white balls. Match the Mega Ball, too, and you win the jackpot. There are prizes for correctly guessing just the Mega number, as well as prizes for guessing some, but not all, of the numbers.
That annuity factors in the interest you’d likely earn on your winnings over those 29 years. So, when interest rates go up, that jackpot goes up, too — even though the actual amount of cash in the jackpot hasn’t changed.Finally, there’s a bit of psychology at play.
Why haven't I won any of them yet?