Mega Millions Record

The popular Mega Millions lottery has set a new record for the largest jackpot. The draw held on March 6 was for a jackpot worth a staggering $390 million, and was won by two lucky ticket-holders - one in New Jersey and one in Georgia.

Until Tuesday night, the biggest Mega Millions lottery jackpot was $363 million, and that was won way back in May 2000 when Mega Millions was still operating under the name of the Big Game. Initial estimates put this week's jackpot at $370 million, so a record breaking win was always on the cards, but the final figure of $390 million was fairly unthinkable a few weeks ago.

Of course, such a huge jackpot will undoubtedly spark a new debate (or breathe new life into the old one, depending on your point of view) about whether we really need to let sums get this big. On one side we have people who say, "Hell yes - the bigger the jackpots are, the better!" On the other side we have people - myself included - who would prefer gargantuan amounts to be shared among a greater number of prize winners.

I'm not saying that we should stop the jackpot fund growing, only that we put a ceiling on the top prize and let any excess "trickle down" to second-tier and possibly even third-tier prize winners. Even if the ceiling was set at a fairly huge sum there would still be plenty for everyone else. For example, putting an upper limit of $200 million on the jackpot would have meant that $190 million could have been shared between second- and third-tier prize winners on Tuesday.

I'm not a communist or a socialist, and I have nothing against the accumulation of personal wealth (if I did I wouldn't play lottery games myself) but, as I've said on numerous occasions, I do think that allowing lottery prizes to grow beyond a certain level is wrong.

Why do I say this? Because money gives a person a great deal of power, and if we don't limit the amount of money that can be acquired without effort, we could potentially be handing a hell of a lot of power to people who have the capacity to use it in foolish and dangerous ways. Maybe I've been watching too many Bond movies again (Casino Royale is out on DVD soon!) but the idea of some loon winning enough money to make a serious bid for global domination doesn't appeal to me. $390 million probably isn't enough to make that possible, but unless the principle of putting a ceiling on lottery jackpots isn't accepted, it won't be long before that situation changes.

Article Last Updated: 08/03/2007 13:12:40

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