South Boston Online is a free weekly news publication serving South Boston and its surrounding communities. The news organization, founded in 1999, publishes online and in print. In this short article, we will turn our attention to effects of winning great on lottery, as well as some testimonies of gambling winners!
Effects of Large Wins
Winning the lottery can bring more
than joy into someone’s life. In fact, it can make their lives a living nightmare. It can cause a great change on a person’s life. When someone goes from having no money or being middle class to having millions of dollars, it’s going to cause a great impact on their lives.
In 1978, a trio of researchers at Northwestern University and the University asked two groups about the happiness in their lives: recent winners of the Illinois State Lottery and victims of catastrophic accidents, who were now paraplegic or quadriplegic. They found that the recent accident victims reported gaining more happiness from these everyday pleasures than the winners.
The study found that the overall happiness levels of lottery winners spiked when they won, but returned to pre-winning levels after just a few months. In terms of overall happiness, the lottery winners were not significantly happier than the non-winners. The accident victims were slightly less happy, but not by much.
Powerball Lottery Testimonies
The Gaming Commission plans on setting these new odds by increasing the numbers to choose from in the first set from 59 to 69 and decreasing the numbers to choose from in the second set from 35 to 26 (playing the Powerball requires a person to choose five numbers from the first set and one number from the second set).
“So many of them wind up unhappy or wind up broke. People have had terrible things happen,” said Don McNay, 56, a financial consultant to lottery winners and the author of Life Lessons from the Lottery. “People commit suicide. People run though their money. Easy comes, easy goes. They go through divorce or people die.”
William and Heather ten Broeke were g
rocery shopping when Heather reminded her husband to buy a Powerball ticket for the Sept. 17 drawing. The ten Broekes arrived at Georgia Lottery headquarters Monday to claim the $246,764,131 million jackpot prize. They selected the cash option, which totaled $165,613,511 before taxes.
One small winner said: “After purchasing the tickets, I bided my time with my chosen numbers, waited until I had the “green” light, and won $450US… This was only my first run! Can you imagine the excitement of discovering you’ve matched 4 out of 5 numbers!”
However, a winner by the name of Whittaker now says that he regrets winning the lottery. “Since I won the lottery, I think there is no control for greed,” he said. “I think if you have something, there’s always someone else that wants it. I wish I’d torn that ticket up.” Whittaker had the very best of intentions.
Of the two winning tickets for the grand $587.5 million Powerball jackpot, only one set of winners has been identified — the Hill family of Missouri. This is, according to witnesses in Maryland, the second winner, captured on security cameras making everyone double-check his ticket. Their reaction, of course, is beyond awesome.
So, wanna give the Powerball a try? Remember – winning the jackpot may not make you happier, but it will make you happier. So, check out the results here: https://www.powerball-lottery.org/results, and see what you can win!
