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Mega Millions, Powerball prizes come down to math, long odds

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DES MOINES, Iowa — For all the anticipation about whether someone will finally snag the gigantic Mega Millions and Powerball jackpots, the games come down to two things: simple math — and very long odds.

But there are some quirks and surprises about the math equations that likely will soon vault someone into stratospheric wealth after the jackpots grew for months without a winner.

WHAT ARE THE JACKPOTS?

The biggest quirk starts with this fact: The advertised $1.6 billion Mega Millions prize — the world’s largest ever lottery jackpot — and $620 million Powerball prize aren’t quite real. That is, those are the amount you’d be paid if you chose an annuity, doled out over 29 years. Nearly every winner opts for cash, which is the amount of money the lottery folks actually have in the bank ready to pay out to the company that would fund the annuity.

The cash option is still massive, at $904 million for Mega Millions and $354.3 million for Powerball. But those numbers aren’t splayed across billboards and shown in countless mini marts across America.

POTENTIAL COMBINATIONS

The dismal odds of winning the Mega Millions jackpot — 1 in 302.5 million — mean there are 302.5 million potential number combinations, or a little less than one combination for each of the 328 million people living in the U.S. For last Friday’s drawing, about 59 per cent of possible combinations were taken. But by Tuesday night’s drawing, officials estimate that 75 per cent will be sold.

That would mean a 25 per cent chance of no winner. If that happens, it’s likely even more combinations would be covered before the next drawing three days later. Officials don’t have an estimate on how many tickets would be sold for that potential drawing, and they haven’t said how large the estimated prize would be. Could it reach $2 billion?

The odds of winning Powerball are 1 in 292.2 million.

AS THE GRAND PRIZE INCREASES, SO DO WINNER NUMBERS

The odds of winning don’t change as jackpots get larger, but the chance that more than one winner will share the prize do. When so many people rush to play as a jackpot soars , the chances increase that two or three tickets — of the millions of tickets sold — will match. Of the five largest jackpots awarded in the U.S., three went to multiple winners. The largest single prize went to a 2017 player from Massachusetts who celebrated a $758.7 million Powerball payday.

TWO JACKPOTS, ONE WINNER?

If the odds of winning either Mega Millions or Powerball don’t seem gigantic enough, how about winning them both? Spend $4 on a ticket for each game and it could happen. But the odds aren’t especially favourable, at about 1 in 88 quadrillion (that’s 88,000,000,000,000,000).

LUCKY NUMBERS

For Mega Millions, players choose six numbers: five from a range of white balls, numbered 1 to 70, and one number for the Mega Ball, with a range of 1 to 25. What numbers have come up most? Since 2010, that honour goes to the number 2, with 92 hits, followed by the numbers 20, 11, 31 and 17. The most hit Mega Ball number is 9.

Lottery officials are quick to point out that the number selection is random, so there’s no reason that what hit in the past will be selected again. The game also has changed over the years, so some numbers included weren’t always in the mix.

LUCKY STATES

Not surprisingly, the most Mega Million jackpot winners in the past five years have come from states with the largest populations. New York, with the nation’s fourth-largest population, leads with seven winners. The No. 1 population state of California is second in Mega Millions winners with six, while Illinois is third with four winners.

Still, there are some quirks, as Georgia has the eight-largest population and three winners and Washington state has two winners but only the 13th largest population. Texas has the nation’s second-largest population, yet players have only bought winning Mega Millions tickets in the state twice in the past five years. And let’s hear it for Rhode Island, the smallest population state to have won a Mega Millions jackpot in the past five years.

AMERICA IS NO. 1

For those with an international bent, the current Mega Millions jackpot has surpassed all lottery jackpot records — so it’s not only the largest lottery prize in U.S. history, it’s now the world’s largest.

The annual El Gordo national lottery in Spain advertises a larger total prize pool, but the money is divvied up into many prizes, according to Seth Elkin, a spokesman for the Maryland lottery, which currently takes questions about the Mega Millions drawing.

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Follow Scott McFetridge on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/smcfetridge

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For the AP’s complete coverage of the lottery: https://apnews.com/Lottery

Scott McFetridge, The Associated Press







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Kananaskis G7 meeting the right setting for U.S. and Canada to reassert energy ties

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Energy security, resilience and affordability have long been protected by a continentally integrated energy sector.

The G7 summit in Kananaskis, Alberta, offers a key platform to reassert how North American energy cooperation has made the U.S. and Canada stronger, according to a joint statement from The Heritage Foundation, the foremost American conservative think tank, and MEI, a pan-Canadian research and educational policy organization.

“Energy cooperation between Canada, Mexico and the United States is vital for the Western World’s energy security,” says Diana Furchtgott-Roth, director of the Center for Energy, Climate and Environment and the Herbert and Joyce Morgan Fellow at the Heritage Foundation, and one of America’s most prominent energy experts. “Both President Trump and Prime Minister Carney share energy as a key priority for their respective administrations.

She added, “The G7 should embrace energy abundance by cooperating and committing to a rapid expansion of energy infrastructure. Members should commit to streamlined permitting, including a one-stop shop permitting and environmental review process, to unleash the capital investment necessary to make energy abundance a reality.”

North America’s energy industry is continentally integrated, benefitting from a blend of U.S. light crude oil and Mexican and Canadian heavy crude oil that keeps the continent’s refineries running smoothly.

Each day, Canada exports 2.8 million barrels of oil to the United States.

These get refined into gasoline, diesel and other higher value-added products that furnish the U.S. market with reliable and affordable energy, as well as exported to other countries, including some 780,000 barrels per day of finished products that get exported to Canada and 1.08 million barrels per day to Mexico.

A similar situation occurs with natural gas, where Canada ships 8.7 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day to the United States through a continental network of pipelines.

This gets consumed by U.S. households, as well as transformed into liquefied natural gas products, of which the United States exports 11.5 billion cubic feet per day, mostly from ports in Louisiana, Texas and Maryland.

“The abundance and complementarity of Canada and the United States’ energy resources have made both nations more prosperous and more secure in their supply,” says Daniel Dufort, president and CEO of the MEI. “Both countries stand to reduce dependence on Chinese and Russian energy by expanding their pipeline networks – the United States to the East and Canada to the West – to supply their European and Asian allies in an increasingly turbulent world.”

Under this scenario, Europe would buy more high-value light oil from the U.S., whose domestic needs would be back-stopped by lower-priced heavy oil imports from Canada, whereas Asia would consume more LNG from Canada, diminishing China and Russia’s economic and strategic leverage over it.

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The MEI is an independent public policy think tank with offices in Montreal, Ottawa, and Calgary. Through its publications, media appearances, and advisory services to policymakers, the MEI stimulates public policy debate and reforms based on sound economics and entrepreneurship.

As the nation’s largest, most broadly supported conservative research and educational institution, The Heritage Foundation has been leading the American conservative movement since our founding in 1973. The Heritage Foundation reaches more than 10 million members, advocates, and concerned Americans every day with information on critical issues facing America.

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Poilievre on 2025 Election Interference – Carney sill hasn’t fired Liberal MP in Chinese election interference scandal

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From Conservative Party Communications

Yes. He must be disqualified. I find it incredible that Mark Carney would allow someone to run for his party that called for a Canadian citizen to be handed over to a foreign government on a bounty, a foreign government that would almost certainly execute that Canadian citizen.

 

“Think about that for a second. We have a Liberal MP saying that a Canadian citizen should be handed over to a foreign dictatorship to get a bounty so that that citizen could be murdered. And Mark Carney says he should stay on as a candidate. What does that say about whether Mark Carney would protect Canadians?

“Mark Carney is deeply conflicted. Just in November, he went to Beijing and secured a quarter-billion-dollar loan for his company from a state-owned Chinese bank. He’s deeply compromised, and he will never stand up for Canada against any foreign regime. It is another reason why Mr. Carney must show us all his assets, all the money he owes, all the money that his companies owe to foreign hostile regimes. And this story might not be entirely the story of the bounty, and a Liberal MP calling for a Canadian to be handed over for execution to a foreign government might not be something that the everyday Canadian can relate to because it’s so outrageous. But I ask you this, if Mark Carney would allow his Liberal MP to make a comment like this, when would he ever protect Canada or Canadians against foreign hostility?

“He has never put Canada first, and that’s why we cannot have a fourth Liberal term. After the Lost Liberal Decade, our country is a playground for foreign interference. Our economy is weaker than ever before. Our people more divided. We need a change to put Canada first with a new government that will stand up for the security and economy of our citizens and take back control of our destiny. Let’s bring it home.”

 

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