UPDATE: The winning Powerball numbers are 8-27-34-4-19 Powerball 10
There was at least one winner of the $1.5 billion jackpot. California Lottery tweeted a winning ticket was sold in Chino Hills.
We have a winner in California! A jackpot-winning ticket was sold in Chino Hills. We’re still awaiting results from other states.
— California Lottery (@calottery) January 14, 2016
ORIGINAL STORY:
More than 292 million combinations of numbers will not win Wednesday night's $1.5 billion Powerball jackpot yet the lines are growing at lottery retailers as time ticks closer to the 10 p.m. ET cutoff for ticket sales in most states.
Then why do so many people buy Powerball tickets when they have virtually no chance of winning the 10:59 p.m. drawing?
“It gives you a license to fantasize,” said Co-Director George Loewenstein of the Center for Behavioral Decision Research at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, who has studied the psychology behind lotteries. “It’s a harmless indulgence as long as you don’t spend a lot of money on it.”
This jackpot is the largest of any lottery game on record in the world, said Kelly Cripe, spokeswoman for the Texas Lottery Commission.
"The thing is you always want to get the big, you know, the big jackpot," said Ruby Garibay of Phoenix, who snagged two tickets Wednesday. "The last ticket I got, I got $4 back, which is great, but you know you're kind of like, ugh, disappointed."
If you lose, you've sacrificed some coffee runs or lunch outside the office for a few $2 tickets. However, if you win — you would have a better chance of being hit by lightning while drowning — a balmy island in the Caribbean is calling your name.
"I have a limit, $3," said Ervin Pope, 52, of Detroit, a cook for a Bob Evans restaurant in Chesterfield Township, Mich. At $2 a ticket, her limit would get her one ticket and what's called the Power Play option, which can double a $1 million win.
The truth is her one ticket has just as much chance of winning as the 10 that Chuck Mady's wife told him to buy when she heard he was going to the store in Detroit. More tickets sold do not guarantee a winner because people and lottery machines can choose the exact same numbers.
As of mid-day Wednesday, Multi-State Lottery Association officials had not increased the Powerball pot as they had for the past several days. If no one wins Wednesday night's drawing, the jackpot for Saturday’s drawing would be an estimated $2 billion with a cash value of $1.24 billion, Cripe said.
"I've had family members pooling," to buy tickets in bulk, said Antonio Gjokaj, 19, of Farmington Hills, Mich., who works at his father's Clique restaurant near downtown Detroit. "I have a cousin who put $5,000 into it."
That's way into the danger zone, experts say. Powerball's appeal is harmful when it starts cutting into basic needs for those with little money to begin with.
“There’s people who buy $100 worth of tickets and don’t have money for unexpected medical expenses,” Loewenstein said.
By Monday evening, Michigan residents were buying $156,000 worth of Powerball tickets every hour, said Jeff Holyfield, a spokesman for the Michigan Lottery. That's what they normally buy in a full day.
A winner of Wednesday's jackpot who is impatient can take the grand prize, payable as an annuity over 30 years, instead as a $930 million lump sum before taxes.
"See you again when I hit the big one," Pope said with a chuckle.
