The payout has to be sufficiently high to make it worth joining in the lottery.
You would never spend $1 for a one in a million shot at winning $10. Everyone is going to have their own idea of how big the jackpot has to be before they are willing to part with $1. Especially with those long odds.
I would guess that the tipping point should be where the jackpot is greater than the odds of winning the jackpot. $1 to win a million when the odds are 1 in a million.
A megamillions ticket costs $2. They try to make the math harder by charging $2 instead of $1.
The odds of winning the jackpot are 1 in 302,575,350.
Using my logic above, it doesn't make any sense to play megamillions if the jackpot is ever below $605,150,700. But if the jackpot is twice that amount like it is now, then maybe it's not so bad to be buying a ticket. With a 302,575,349 in 302,575,350 shot of losing, you're still going to lose that $2. But maybe you had fun. And what were you going to do with $2 anyway, buy a cheeseburger off the McDonald's dollar menu? Mmm cheeseburgers.
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