When walking into most 7-Elevens or gas station marts, customers and passersby are greeted by a lit up plastic sign with the word “Powerball” written on it. Below the word is a two or three digit number in red lights, showing the amount, in millions, of the Powerball lottery

But, for the first time ever, the Powerball crossed the $2 billion threshold, resulting in a payout of nearly $1 billion for the winner. With the odds of winning at 1 in 292.2 million, it is nearly impossible to win the Powerball. But that didn’t stop millions from attempting to win by buying the $2 Powerball tickets. The drawing for the winning number occurs every Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday at 10:59 p.m.. “I bought a few tickets before every drawing for about two weeks,” senior Luke Danielian said.

After over three months, a winning number was finally drawn for the Powerball jackpot. The winning number came from a convenience store in California, which resulted in the owner of the shop receiving a $1 million bonus for being the one to sell a $2 billion ticket. $2 billion is an unfathomable amount of money for most people, which raises the question: What can you buy with that amount of money?

Studies have shown that most lottery winners go broke within three to five years of winning. However, this lottery payout is a whole different story. With $2 billion, you could buy the entire Washington Nationals baseball team, two million iPhone 14 pros, your very own space mission to Mars or pretty much anything else you could think of. “If I won, I would invest most of my money in things like the stock market and real estate,” junior Daniel Son said.

While millions are disappointed they weren’t able to win the massive jackpot, it may have turned out better that they didn’t win. Winning the lottery doesn’t just magically make all your problems go away. They say that having more money causes more problems, and that is especially true when it comes to winning large amounts of money at one time, like in a lottery. When people win the lottery, their closest friends and family members can start to change and become greedy. They can feel that they are entitled to some of the money. This can tear families and friendships apart, and, according to CNBC, this causes the winner to become suicidal and struggle with drug and alcohol addiction. “I wouldn’t want to win the lottery if I knew that all of these things would come with the winnings,” senior Shelby Parsons said.