Powerball winner Tim Schultz joins Tim O’Brien to talk about what it’s like to win the lottery, and what you should do if you ever hit the jackpot for that big lottery prize. Tim is a YouTuber and the host of a podcast called Lottery, Dreams and Fortune. While working in a gas station to put himself through college, Tim won the $28 million Powerball prize in 1999 and his life hasn’t been the same since.
Even if you’re not a gambler, chances are at some point you bought a lottery ticket.
Maybe you don’t buy a ticket that often, but when the jackpot gets up to $100 million, $500 million or even a billion dollars, it gets tempting.
As they say, “You gotta play to win.”
There are two lottery games that seem to draw the most attention for their big jackpots – Powerball and Mega Millions.
Since 2016, there have been six jackpots in America that surpassed $1 billion. Three in the past year alone.
The largest lottery jackpot to date was the Powerball drawing on November 2, 2022. Someone bought a ticket at Joe’s Service Center in Altadena, California, not far from Pasadena. It’s not clear yet whether the winner has claimed the prize, but whoever it is, won over $2 billion before taxes.
The second-biggest jackpot was also a Powerball ticket that was split three ways. On January 13th, 2016, winners came from California, Florida and Tennessee.
The third biggest jackpot was a Mega Millions winner. This time from South Carolina. That person claimed the $1.5 billion jackpot. We don’t know who it was, but they opted to take a one-time lump sum of $877 million before taxes.
If you’re like me, once you buy that ticket, and up until the drawing, your imagination can run wild. What would you do with all that money?
It’s just that sort of thinking that captures the attention of millions who buy those lottery tickets.
Back in 1999, Tim Schultz was working at a gas station to put himself through college. But then fate happened. Tim sold himself a winning Powerball ticket. The prize was $28 million.
That doesn’t mean he took home all $28 million. While he can’t say how much he did take home all winners have the option of taking a lump sum, which is usually a little more than half of the publicized jackpot. And then there are the taxes. No matter who wins the lottery in a given week, Uncle Sam always gets a cut.
The idea that someone actually gets all that money is one of the biggest myths surrounding the lottery. Tim says there are other myths as well.
Links
- Tim Schultz YouTube Channel
- Lottery, Dreams and Fortune Podcast, with Tim Schultz (Spotify)
- Powerball, website
- I’m the Lottery Winner Who Bagged a $28 Million Jackpot, The Sun
About this Episode’s Guest Tim Schultz
Timothy Schultz is a YouTuber and host of the podcast, Lottery, Dreams and Fortune. It features human interest stories of overcoming the odds and the belief that anything is possible. This includes interviews with lottery winners.
In fact, Timothy Schultz is a lottery winner himself. In 1999, he won the Powerball jackpot in the USA before going back to college to study broadcast news and work on various productions. He’s now combining his experience to meet and interview other people who have experienced sudden wealth or overcome the odds in life. Watch Timothy Schultz on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/c/timothyschultz .
