Latest news with #multimillionaires
Daily Mail
08-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Foolproof way to win any jackpot according to maths (but there is a teeny catch)
I have a completely foolproof, 100-per-cent-guaranteed method for winning any lottery you like. If you follow my very simple method, you will absolutely win the maximum jackpot possible. There is just one teeny, tiny catch – you're going to need to already be a multimillionaire, or at least have a lot of rich friends. Let's take the US Powerball lottery as an example. To play, you pick five different 'white' numbers from 1 to 69, and a sixth 'red' number from 1 to 26 – this last number can be a repeat of one of the white ones. How many different possible lottery tickets are there? To calculate that, we need to turn to a field of mathematics called combinatorics, which, as the name suggests, is a way of calculating the number of possible combinations of objects. Picking numbers from an unordered set, as with a lottery, is an example of an 'n choose k' problem, where n is the total number of objects we can choose from (69 in the case of the white Powerball numbers) and k is the number of objects we want to pick from that set. Crucially, because you can't repeat the white numbers, these choices are made 'without replacement' – as each winning numbered ball is selected for the lottery, it doesn't go back into the pool of available choices. Mathematicians have a handy formula for calculating the number of possible results of an n choose k problem: n! / (k! × (n – k)!). If you've not encountered it before, a mathematical '!' doesn't mean we're very excited – it's a symbol that stands for the factorial of a number, which is simply the number you get when you multiply a whole number, or integer, by all of those smaller than itself. For example, 3! = 3 × 2 × 1 = 6. Plugging in 69 for n and 5 for k, we get a total of 11,238,513. That's quite a lot of possible lottery tickets, but as we will see later on, perhaps not enough. This is where the red Powerball comes in – it essentially means you are playing two lotteries at once and must win both for the largest prize. This makes it a lot harder to win. If you just simply added a sixth white ball, you'd have a total of 119,877,472 possibilities. But because there are 26 possibilities for red balls, we multiply the combinations of the white balls by 26 to get a total of 292,201,338 – much higher. Ok, so we have just over 292 million possible Powerball tickets. Now, here comes the trick to always winning – you simply buy every possible ticket. Simple maybe isn't quite the right word here, given the logistics involved, and most importantly, with tickets costing $2 apiece, you will need to have over half a billion dollars on hand. Is it enough to absolutely guarantee a big payout? That's a slightly tricky question to answer. The Powerball jackpot rolls over each week it remains unclaimed, meaning the amount you can win varies. But there have been only 15 examples of the jackpot getting higher than the $584 million you need to buy every ticket, so most of the time it's not worth it. The profit in doing so is further diminished by the fact that jackpots can be shared by multiple winners who choose the same numbers, and that around 30 per cent of the winnings are taken in tax. In a way, none of this should be surprising – if there was a guaranteed way to win lotteries and make a profit, people would be doing it all the time and lottery runners would go bust. But surprisingly, badly designed lotteries do crop up – and savvy investors sweep in to make a killing. One of the first examples of this kind of lottery busting involved the writer and philosopher Voltaire. Together with Charles Marie de La Condamine, a mathematician, he formed a syndicate to buy all the tickets in a lottery linked to French government debt. Exactly how he went about this is murky and there is some suggestion of skullduggery, such as not having to pay full price for the tickets, but the upshot is that the syndicate appears to have won repeatedly before the authorities shut the lottery down in 1730. Writing about it later, in the third person, Voltaire said 'winning lots were paid in cash and all in such a way that any group of people who had bought all the tickets stood to win a million francs. Voltaire entered into association with numerous company and struck lucky.' More modern lotteries have also suffered the same fate. A famous example is the Irish National Lottery, which was bought out by a syndicate of a couple dozen people in 1992. At the time, players had to pick six numbers from 1 to 36, which our n choose k formula tells us produces 1,947,792 possible tickets. With tickets costing 50 Irish pence (the currency at the time), the conspirators raised the necessary £973,896 and began buying tickets for an estimated £1.7 million prize draw. Lottery organisers got wind of the scheme and began limiting the number of tickets each vendor could sell, meaning the syndicate only managed to purchase about 80 per cent of ticket combinations. In the end, it shared the jackpot with two other winners, giving it a loss-making prize of £568,682. Luckily for the syndicate, the lottery had also introduced a guaranteed £100 prize for matching four numbers, which brought its total to £1,166,000. The Irish National Lottery quickly changed the rules to avoid a similar scheme, and these days requires six numbers chosen from 47, upping the number of tickets to 10,737,573. The jackpot is capped at €18.9 million, while tickets are €2 each, ensuring that buying the lottery will never be profitable. Despite the fact that the risks of a poorly designed lottery should now be well understood, these incidents may still be occurring. One extraordinary potential example came in 2023, when a syndicate won a $95 million jackpot in the Texas State Lottery. The Texas lottery is 54 choose 6, a total of 25,827,165 combinations, and tickets cost $1 each, making this a worthwhile enterprise – but the syndicate may have had assistance from the lottery organisers themselves. While the fallout from the scandal is still unfolding, and it is not known whether anything illegal has occurred, the European-based syndicate, working through local retailers, may have acquired ticket-printing terminals from the organisers of the Texas lottery, allowing it to purchase the necessary tickets and smooth over the logistics. The lottery commissioner at the time has denied being part of any illegal scheme. And no criminal charges have been filed – the lawyer that represents the syndicate that claimed the jackpot, known as Rook TX, said 'All applicable laws, rules and regulations were followed.' So there you have it. Provided that you have a large sum of upfront cash, and can find a lottery where the organisers have failed to do their due diligence with the n choose k formula, you can make a tidy profit. Good luck!
Japan Times
04-07-2025
- Business
- Japan Times
Who won and lost in Trump's tax bill
Business investors and wealthy Americans are among the biggest winners in U.S. President Donald Trump's tax bill. Those hit the hardest by the sweeping package include elite universities, who face new levies, and immigrants. The House passed the bill in a 218-214 vote just a day ahead of Trump's self-imposed July 4 deadline. Here's who won and who lost in the legislative centerpiece of the president's domestic agenda: Winners Multimillionaires The rich gain the ability to pass more wealth on to their heirs and dodge a tax increase. The bill includes $4.5 trillion worth of tax cuts, according to a Saturday estimate from the Joint Committee on Taxation. The estate tax exemption rises to $15 million for individuals — totaling $30 million for married couples — and then adjusts with inflation. The 2017 Trump income tax rate cuts also become permanent, with benefits skewing toward the wealthy. Residents of high-tax states The limit on the state and local tax deduction rises to $40,000 annually for a five-year period. The write-off phases out for taxpayers who make more than $500,000 per year. After the five-year period, the limit snaps back to the current $10,000 limit imposed in the 2017 tax law. Small business owners The 2017 law that allowed pass-through business to deduct up to 20% of their qualified business income from their taxable income is permanently extended beginning in the tax year 2026. The deduction is available to owners of sole proprietorships, LLCs and partnerships. Private equity The carried interest tax break benefiting private equity, venture capital and real estate partnerships is maintained, despite the president's push to eliminate it. Private equity also won an expanded interest expensing tax break. Domestic car dealers Up to $10,000 a year in loan interest for U.S.-made cars becomes tax deductible through 2028, a boon to auto dealers looking to close sales. But the break phases out slowly for individuals with more than $100,000 in income and couples with more than $200,000. Manufacturers The bill revives several favorable tax rules for businesses, including bonus depreciation for the cost of production upgrades and a research and development tax break, winning the endorsement of the National Association of Manufacturers. The final legislation makes permanent those breaks, which were temporary in an earlier version of the bill that passed the House in May. Fossil fuel producers Industries like coal, oil and natural gas win tax breaks and new requirements to open up more federal land for drilling, while breaks for competing clean energy technologies are phased out. Elderly and tipped workers In a nod to some of Trump's populist campaign promises, taxpayers 65 and older get a larger standard deduction, while tips and overtime pay are exempted from income taxes. The provisions include limits to shrink their cost and expire after 2028. Parents The maximum child tax credit increases by an additional $200 from $2,000 starting in tax year 2025 and is permanently indexed to inflation. Parents could open up new "Trump accounts' for their babies seeded with $1,000 from the government for children born from 2025 through 2028. Telecommunications The bill auctions off a massive amount of radio spectrum for use in wireless broadband, a potential boon for services like SpaceX's Starlink and 5G and future 6G mobile networks. Corporations Other tax increases that had been considered that would have hit big business, such as an increase in the stock buyback tax or a limit on the state and local deduction for corporations, were mostly rejected. Defense contractors The package boosts defense spending by $150 billion, with much of the funding going to new weapons systems made by major contractors. Space The bill provides nearly $10 billion to fund projects including efforts to reach the Moon and Mars and eventually decommission the international space station. Losers Low-income Americans Some of the costs for the tax bill are defrayed through cuts to Medicaid health coverage and food stamps, both of which benefit low-income Americans. On average, the legislation will cost the bottom 20% of taxpayers $560 a year, according to a Yale Budget Lab analysis. Senior citizens receive a hot meal at a community center in Charleston, West Virginia, in March. | REUTERS The measure creates new work requirements for Medicaid recipients, unless they are elderly, disabled or have children under 14 years old. Medicaid beneficiaries who gained eligibility through the Affordable Care Act will have to pay a share of costs through charges like co-pays. Food assistance for low-income Americans is cut by expanding existing work requirements for federal food stamps to cover beneficiaries up to 65 years old. Beginning in 2028, states also are required to pay a portion of food benefit costs, which are now fully paid by the federal government. Renewable energy Clean energy industries are hit by the Republican plan, which rolls back many provisions of former President Joe Biden's landmark climate law. A tax credit for solar panels and wind systems is quickly phased out, though the legislation takes more time to eliminate other clean electricity production and investment credits. Tax credits for energy efficiency home improvements and residential installation of solar or other clean energy upgrades are eliminated at the end of the year. Technology companies The Senate squelched a controversial effort in the bill to prevent U.S. states from regulating artificial intelligence, delivering a win for tech industry critics and a blow to the likes of Microsoft Corp. and Meta Platforms Inc., as well as venture capital firms like Andreessen Horowitz. Trump administration officials and GOP allies in Silicon Valley had pushed the measure saying it would prevent a patchwork of cumbersome state-by-state regulations. Electric vehicle makers Tesla, General Motors and other electric vehicle makers are hit by elimination of a consumer tax credit of up to $7,500 for the purchase of electric vehicles. Elite universities Add tax bills to the escalating battle the Trump administration is waging against elite universities such as Harvard and Columbia. The current 1.4% tax on net investment income of private college and university endowments ratchets up for better-funded institutions. The new tiered tax rate structure climbs as high as 8% for colleges with the most endowment income per student. Immigrants Several provisions raise taxes on immigrants. That includes a new 1% tax on transfers of money to foreign countries, known as remittances. Many immigrants in the U.S. send money to relatives in their countries of origin. The proposal also restricts some immigrants' access to tax credits for health coverage premiums. The change prevents many immigrants granted asylum or temporary protected status from accessing those credits. Gamblers Gamblers would only be able to deduct 90% of their losses against their winnings, leading to a situation where they could still owe income tax if they break even over a year or lose money overall.
