Suppose you were to win the lottery, but instead of receiving a specific amount, you had to choose between 3 amounts. $1m, $5m and $50 million. Which amount would you chose and why?

Note that I have chosen the amounts in that each should make a significant difference to your life but whereas $1m might allow you to retire 10 years earlier, startup a business, pay off debt it might not affect your circle of friends, lifestyle, job etc. $5m would allow you to totally transform you life, new car, house, holiday house, overseas hoolidays, immediate retirement and could mean leaving all your old friends and neighbourhoods, life etc for a totally new one.

$50m is an amount that most people would not understand how exactly to spend and its potential to destroy is high.

Consider how your winnings might affect your children and how they value money, your friends (if you tell them), if you give money away see how this gift might affect the friendship of people who you gave money to.

I know two instances where people have won lotteries, the one was $30m, the other $4m, and am able to watch the $4m story unfold, the $30m I have limited visibility of. Note that the history of past lottery winners is filled with bankruptcy, suicide, heartbreak as they struggle to handle the corrupting power of money.

Make your choice.

mattwilson wrote:Easy, 50 million because I have many people I love and care about who would appreciate a few million, and I have charities I would love to support

Yep me too, and I've been skint my whole adult life so I deserve it

I'd take the $50m. I'll be a little surprised if there's anyone who wouldn't.

50% would go to charity. 50% of the remainder would be split among my family and friends. I'd keep the remaining $12.5m.

Of what I keep, a significant portion - say $4m - I'd put into playing poker with a view to turning pro. I strongly suspect that I'd encounter a much higher class of player than I currently do. But with that much money I could afford some training sessions with the pros.

I think I'd stash another $5m or so in a high-interest bank account somewhere. The leftovers ($3.5m) should be enough to buy a nice house and car and live the life of Riley!

I would take 50 million and become a producer of nature and sciece documentaries.
I do hate when people win high amounts and say, "I'm gonna pay my morgage and go on a holiday, maybe get a new car. Tee hee hee."
Money's wasted on unimaginative assholes.

I'd take the 50m and immediately give at least half of it to charity. A sizeable chunk of the rest will go to my immediate family, so my parents never need to work again and can do whatever they like for the rest of their lives. I'll also give a (relatively) small amount to my closest friends, but any cheeky gits that come looking for free handouts will be given the boot.

I'll get a few houses in different places around the world, and set aside enough money so I can have a nice comfy life while still studying. I won't need to get a job so I'll probably get involved in comp sci research, funding research groups and messing around on my own projects. Whatever's left afterwards can go to charity. I'm not a particularly extravagant person so I don't see myself blowing millions on private jets and flashy cars and other such nonsense.

Well, assuming the 50 mill was after all taxes, theres 125 acres in a place called Ravensdale that has a small lake and a magificent view of Mt Rainier. It's 4 different parcels, some wooded and some grassland and cable to the edge of the property with a total price of about 3.5 mill. To develope it and build the castle I want would be another 10 to 12 mill. On top of the various rooms you would find in a castle, it's got 12 suites with the master in the penthouse with a rooftop garden. The whole thing looks very medieval but is very high tech with all the modern conveniences. I still haven't decided whether to go as a bed and breakfast type set up or just allow a few select people live there. Of course, every castle needs a village which would match the architecture and would be available for rental. They would have their own facilities but meals would be an event held in the great hall of the castle. Of course, every castle needs a chapel so weddings would be a common event. All the revenues generated are just to keep it all afloat. Taxes, staff and whatever other overhead there is.
Along with that I would build myself a stable of classic muscle cars running on electric and biodiesel.

Well, there went about 25 mill. Theres a few small charities like the local food bank that I would make some generous donations to on a regular basis. But honestly, I'd keep most of it for myself. A few mill would pay off the mortgages on most of my family members and a few more would simply get a small house that they wouldn't otherwise have. After that I hope to never see them again. Theres a few friends and family members that I would lay a couple million on and a few kids whose education I would pay for. At this point I'm down to about 15 mill which is what I would live on for the rest of my life.

I'd take 50 million and keep it all for myself.

No surprises there.

50 m, so i never had to work again, of course!

Considering I'm translating $1 million into Rands, I'm looking at R7 million that's quite a sum of money. I'd be able to give each of the kids R1 million and leave some in a trust fund for the grandchildren. That would leave me with a couple of million to spend on travel, including going to all the countries that speak English at least and Europe (in style) and some for charity. Each of the kids could pay off a mortgage and have a little change, which would make their lives so much easier. So $50 million is a huge amount, like half a billion Rand. With that I could set up the school my kids would like to own and help them run it, and I'd be able to travel to everywhere in the world and meet all of you in person. Hell I'd set up a fund to help some of you who I think really deserve it. (Paula, you'd get a trip to visit me here, when it's cold in Scotland. that would be a hoot!)

[quote="matt
I like you too.

Do we actually know that people's lives are commonly ruined by huge lottery winnings? I know that's the common wisdom, but on what is it based?

Shrunk wrote:Do we actually know that people's lives are commonly ruined by huge lottery winnings? I know that's the common wisdom, but on what is it based?

I'm not sure where the information come's from either. In the UK there have been a few well publicised stories about lottery winner's ruined lives. I think because they're so rich they can afford to fuck up in some spectacular ways, making it particularly newsworthy. But I'd guess for every one that goes wrong there are quite a few where it has improved their lives no end. I think the latter group would be far less likely to seek publicity too. Happy endings don't make for good reality TV or tabloid stories

mattwilson wrote:The money doesn't make them miserable, just like the money doesn't make people happy.

Money gives options, good and bad, and it's the options people take that decide their fate.

Well said Matt. So true. A few quid right now would make me very happy though

"Money doesn’t make you happy. I have $50 million but I was just as happy when I had $48 million."
— Arnold Schwarzenegger

There are some studies where they followed the fortunes of lottery winners - will try and find this. Here is an interesting reference to lottery winners happiness levels and accident victims.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/690806

They found that mostly they wer worse off than before. The issues seemed to be the inabaility to manage the money on the basis they did not have the experience to know how to moderate their spending usually betwen capital and operating cost - ie. buying a home for $5m is quite easy, however it might take another $500k to run the house each year, and many winners were unable to manage the ongoing cost of their expensive assets. I knew a man who lost both wealth parents when he was in his early 20's. He bought himself an expensive car, a helicopter and boat. 30 years on I believe he now has much less, presumably because he was unable to handle that quantity of money.

The people I know who won lottery have found their teenage kids think life will be easy (they did not tell the kids) as Mum does not work, Dad has an easy job and they lstill ive a great life - ergo you dont need to work to live the good life. They fell out with the friends they shared the winning ticket with, spent wildly for the first few years, left the city they were in because of this, nearly split as a couple and moved cities to start a new life. Now they live a more moderate lifestyle (aside from the kids attitude to money) - they won $4m split between 2 couples - $2m per family.
The $30m winner was busted by the press. He pulled his son from school to avoid kidnap ransom, moves suburbs and now spends his time managing the money, has bought a flash house and car, but lives among peoplpe who have far more than he does so has some perspective.

I think giving money to friends would create issues. How much do you give. to whom, do you judge how they spend it, what if you run out of money, is it still really your money?