--- title: 600,000 People Shared a Mathematically Inept Powerball Post description: The Powerball lottery jackpot is expected to grow to a record $1.3 billion by the next drawing on Wednesday night. canonical: https://time.com/4175797/powerball-math-facebook-post/ author: Megan McCluskey article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-01-11T20:18:57.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:47:45.310Z og:title: Over 800,000 People Shared This Mathematically Inept Powerball Post og:description: The numbers just don't add up og:url: https://time.com/4175797/powerball-math-facebook-post/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Over 800,000 People Shared This Mathematically Inept Powerball Post twitter:description: The numbers just don't add up twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # More Than 800,000 People Shared This Mathematically Inept Powerball Post > Sponsored content. 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The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. ## Video: What To Do With Your Piles Of Cash After Winning The Powerball [Watch (HLS stream): What To Do With Your Piles Of Cash After Winning The Powerball](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/5KvH2pPv.m3u8) (1:55)  _Published 2016-01-11. Before you make a mattress out of money, take these steps to protect your new fortune._  by [Megan McCluskey](https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Jan 11, 2016 8:18 PM UTC  by [Megan McCluskey](https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Jan 11, 2016 8:18 PM UTC The [Powerball lottery jackpot](http://time.com/4171474/powerball-lottery-more-likely-win/) is expected to grow to a record [$1.4 billion](http://time.com/4169112/powerball-lottery-winner/) by the next drawing on Wednesday night. When that estimate grew to $1.3 billion, a lottery meme began circulating on social media claiming that if the jackpot were divided evenly among all Americans, poverty would become nonexistent. So what’s the problem? Well, the math is completely wrong. The meme states that $1.3 billion divided among 300 million people would come out to $4.33 million per person. In reality, it would only equal about $4.33 per person. [Gizmodo](http://factually.gizmodo.com/powerball-math-1-3-billion-divided-by-300-million-is-1752269297) also points out that the population of the United States is closer to 319 million, meaning that everyone would actually only receive around $4.09\. And of course, all of those figures don’t even take into account the fact that the payout will be [_significantly_ ](http://money.cnn.com/2016/01/08/pf/taxes/powerball-jackpot-tax-bill/)[reduced by taxes](http://money.cnn.com/2016/01/08/pf/taxes/powerball-jackpot-tax-bill/). **Read More:** [Here’s a Guaranteed Way to Win the Powerball Jackpot](http://time.com/4175605/powerball-jackpot-guarantee-win/) The Facebook post currently has more than 400,000 likes and 813,000 shares, and has even inspired several counter-memes. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4175797/powerball-math-facebook-post/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4175797/powerball-math-facebook-post/"},"headline":"More Than 800,000 People Shared This Mathematically Inept Powerball Post","datePublished":"2016-01-11T20:18:57.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:47:45.310Z","description":"The numbers just don't add up","url":"https://time.com/4175797/powerball-math-facebook-post/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Social Media","Internet","facebook","Lottery","Powerball"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Megan McCluskey","jobTitle":"Staff Writer","url":"https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4175797/powerball-math-facebook-post/","name":"More Than 800,000 People Shared This Mathematically Inept Powerball Post"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"What To Do With Your Piles Of Cash After Winning The Powerball","description":"Before you make a mattress out of money, take these steps to protect your new fortune.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/5KvH2pPv/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2016-01-11T17:40:58.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/5KvH2pPv.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/4175797/powerball-math-facebook-post/","duration":"PT1M55S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/4175797/powerball-math-facebook-post/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```