$356 MILLION: Mega Millions lottery jackpot nears record

Out working in the flowerbeds and found a 4 leaf clover.   Stopped and bought my ticket.  (Would have bought one anyway).  No lines here for tickets yet.   Of course Tuesday is still a ways away.   Good luck to everyone.   May your foundest dream come true!

Null, I feel for ya.....on 255 million, the feds get 35% at the end of the tax year(although its stated on the lottery website they keep 25%), then you get 10.8 % Jersey state tax...soooo if ya take the 255 million and multiply it times (35+10.8) 45.8 %......
$255,000,000.00    x  .458 tax rate......drum roll please.....you get to keep................................................................
...138 million and change after taxes(roughly)...TAA DAAA 

Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's.

 

Max...I agree with you on the gift issue..while the gift is a very generous thing to do, it is  considered a gift and not a loan....  the giver wants to see the receiver exercise some of the same ideas on how to spend it, as the giver sees it.....I wonder  if you could just offer to pay down their bills up to the 13K/26K ( IRS max allowed to be given as a gift) instead ? Might be an option of generosity that would be acceptable....imho

even still is such a huge amount of money... i would gladly still accept this any hour of the day!!!! got a few of my quick picks from random gas stations around town... still workin on my numbers... will proally spend about $20 in all... i know my day will come.. i just hope its Tuesday!!!! ;-)

what is imho??

In my humble opinion

Because, Null Space, if you study the IRS code online, you will notice that lottery winnings are taxed as "earned income."  If you read the U.S.A. Federal Income Tax Table's "earned income" brackets, you will find out that big lottery jackpot winners are instantly ALL in the top income tax bracket, which is 35% (even those very rare MM and PB jackpot winners who take the annuity amount -- which would still be in the top income tax bracket each year). 

Consequently, if you read that your Lottery Headquarters in only withdrawing 25% U.S.A. Federal Income [plus your State Income Tax (and some winners also get County and/or Municipal lottery taxes withdrawn)], then you must deduce that you still will owe your Federal Government the remaining, approximately 10% due on your own, annual, tax form submittal.  You will need to pay that remaining approximately 10% before the prior year's income taxes are due the following year, by April 15th 'ish.  If you forget to pay that approximate 10% Income Tax (subtract appropriate amount if a corporation or charity or foundation or gave to a charity), remaining, the IRS will soon write to you announcing that they've penalized you an additional % Fine.  I bet that the U.S.A. Federal IRS isn't unaccustomed to tracking and collecting this.

I will not willingly render unto Caesar my hard earned money so drooling liberal men in this country can go to Zimbabwe to watch men there wash their genitalia for "science." Let them pay for their own sick-minded sexcapades. 

And I will never willingly render unto Caesar money to slaughter innocent babies or euthanize old people.

Ain't happenin'.

Period.

They both exist?

set up a charitable organization like the bigwigs do to avoid estate tax etc with part of your money. do good deeds. pay yourself and others to work there. write off expenses. There is a website you can go to where you can look at the tax returns of charities and what they actually give out of the money received.  Since you aren't collecting donations from anyone all you need to worry about is what fits the rules - not the morality aspect of taking someone's money and not giving it to the intended target.

Barron Hilton pledged to give away his fortune to charity. You can just imagine the salaries the Hilton's are pulling in from that charity. By doing that, his fortune was not taxed to death when he died (if he is dead)

cool.. thanks!!!

"Paying some more tax won't make that much difference" ? Tell that to those who live in states that charge over 10% state income tax(NJ 10.8%) on top of the 35% Federal tax rate (they only take out 25% initially but you WILL be on the hook for the other 10%.

If there is a sole winner who happened to live in NJ, their $255 million cash prize would have 25.5 million in State and 89.3 million in Federal tax obligations making the total tax almost 115 million. I know the president cries about the rich paying their fare share but this is insane.

A 356 million jackpot ends up netting 140 million...don't get me wrong as I would be overjoyed if I won but 140 million doesn't quite go as far as the $356 million that the media wants most people to believe they will win.

I certainly believe in God, but what is conotated here is that I would owe 10% to some church's collection plate.  Well, I think I could put that 10% to work much better than 99.9% of the so called churches out there operating out of some prefab acme steel building. 

As for Caesar, I KNOW I can help those that are worthy of my help mo betta than present day Caesar can.  I trust myself more than I do "Caesar" to figure out who would benefit from my largess the most.

I had generally assumed the actual cash after taxes would be 1/3 of the jackpot... But i agree w u saying the media makes it seem like the winner will actually receive $356,000,000.00 (looks so much nicer to put the zeros!!) and while 140-170,000,000.00 would b more than enough for me and my family, the people/groups hounding for money i doubt will c it that way... I am ok w Indiana getting 3.5%... but 35% is high!!