Your chances of winning a lottery jackpot like the Powerball or Mega Millions are so slim that they may as well be nonexistent. According to Powerball.com, the odds of a Powerball jackpot winning are 1 in 292 million (or 1 in 292,201,338, to be precise.)
The smart folks over at Business Insider ran the numbers, and they ain't pretty. Buying lottery tickets is such a colossal waste of time that you may as well just burn the cash at home instead of heading to the store to buy them — it would be quicker.
But, as the saying goes, you can’t win if you don’t play. Here’s a list of events (that we definitely didn’t make up) that are more likely to happen than winning the Powerball.
Don’t say we didn’t warn you.
- Have an IQ higher than a really smart guy like Stephen Hawking or someone like that – (1 out of 107 million)
- Give birth to an octopus, even without the help of fertility treatments – (1 in 729,000)
- Be killed by an asteroid strike because Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck failed to blow it up before it collided with Earth – (1 in 700,000)
- Becoming a billionaire, playboy-philanthropist who is also an alcoholic like Tony Stark from the Marvel movies – (1 in 575,097)
- Be killed by a lightning strike and then get super electric powers – (1 in 164,968)
- Die by drowning before Aquaman can rescue you – (1 in 1,113)
- Be struck by lightning, while drowning – (1 in 183 million)