I won't, first of all. In order to win the lottery, you need to buy a ticket, and I haven't done that for years. It amazes me how many people do buy tickets, and it further amazes me that most of the people I observe buying tickets can hardly afford to. Me, I already give the government well over a quarter of what I make and I don't understand the allure of handing them more of my money in the impossible hope they'll return it a millionfold.
You don't need an advanced math degree to realize the futility. Just ask yourself: given a 6/49 type lottery, would you choose to play the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6? If not, why not? They have just as good a chance of coming up as any other set of numbers.
The love of my life does very occasionally allow her dreams to override her common sense, and by very occasionally, I mean once or twice a year. So it's theoretically possible for us to suddenly come into a hell of a lot of money.
If it does happen--and I know how insane this sounds--I hope it's only a hell of a lot of money, and not a metric butt-load. I'd gladly take a million, and wouldn't pause if a million was two million. (Perhaps I should insert the fact here that all Canadian lottery winnings are tax-free, to prevent any Americans reading this from automatically dividing these figures in half.) But we have Lotto Max now. It routinely pays out fifty million.
Fifty million dollars. If that figure doesn't make you wince, it should.
What price life as you know it? Is it worth fifty million bucks to have to question almost every social interaction you have from the winning point forward? (Yeah, I know you wouldn't treat me any differently just because I'm suddenly fabulously wealthy, but Bob over there, not to mention all the seventh-grade classmates coming out of the woodwork?)
It goes without saying that we would help family and friends out. It also goes without saying that a line would have to be drawn somewhere, both in respect to dollar value and proximity of relationship, and those who find themselves on the other side of either line--WILL hate me. No amount of money is worth the hatred of loved ones...and that hatred is inevitable. Not because we'd be chintzy with our winnings, but because fifty million dollars.
Our lifestyle wouldn't change much, externally. We would have a new house built, but not a mansion: we're only two people. I'd stipulate to the builder that said house would be no bigger than three thousand square feet, and would not appear ostentatious in any way. The lot would have a view of water and the kitchen would be impressive but that's it. No amount of money would coerce me into buying a second property. To me, owning property that sits vacant ninety percent of the time makes no sense whatsoever.
We would travel--but not near as much as you'd think, on account of us being homebodies. And we'd eschew the first-class treatment as much as possible, because we're not, to put it bluntly, first-class people. I like food I can identify and pronounce and the idea of having to dress up for something as simple as a dinner fills me with dread. A butler? Pour moi? Don't make me laugh.
A housekeeper--yeah. That I'd have, and it wouldn't take fifty million bucks in my bank account, either. I know people who claim to enjoy keeping house. The clinical term for these folks is FREAKING NUTS.
I really like Spider Robinson's idea for disposing of vast sums of unneeded cash. You select for professions you think you'll have need of someday, find people enrolled in school for those professions, especially those who just miss out on the big scholarships. You offer to pay their way through school in return for a lifetime's worth of free service for you and your family/friends. Draw it all up nice and neat in a contract and repeat as needed. This is definitely something we would do.
Charities: yes. Selected very carefully, with an eye towards those that aren't in business to perpetuate themselves. I might be wrong and I know this sounds cold, but it really seems like many of them are. When seventy or eighty cents of every dollar goes to administration, overhead and such, there's something wrong. And I can't help but think if we really wanted to cure any number of diseases, we'd have done it by now. How many millions of dollars have gone into cancer research?
Probably the first thing I'd do, after I return from hiding, is hire a financial advisor to determine what "enough" money actually is for us. Because "enough" is really all I'd like to have. Anything more than "enough" is "too much".
What would you do with vast sums of cash?
2 comments:
Tear down my house and have a new one built on top :) take a nice long vacation, and learn peace :) sky dive and do shit a person could only lie in bed and dream of :)
I'd like to think that winning vast amounts of money on the Lottery wouldn't turn my head. But of course, it would turn my head, I wouldn't be human if I didn't.
Initially, I think I'd panic. Everyone always thinks that you crack open the champagne and start dancing, that you'll never have to worry about anything every again. But I doubt it's really like that. As you say, people you might have passed on the street might suddenly feel that they've been lifelong friends with you. It's an absolute minefield.
Hopefully, I'd keep my wits about me if I ever won it big. I think I'd want to put enough away so that I wouldn't have to worry about money for the rest of my life. I'd also want to pay off my mortgage, as that's something I'd prefer not to have hanging over me if I had the choice.
But aside from that, I can't really think of anything I'm yearning for. Perhaps I'd take more holidays and maybe I wouldn't think so hard about buying something I wanted. But I'd have to have wanted it prior to the win. I can't say that I'm in any way interested in a Ferrari, a diamond-encrusted toilet and a private jet now, so I wouldn't go rushing out to buy them after a big win.
Of course, I very rarely buy a Lottery ticket, so I doubt I'm in any danger of waking up as a millionaire. But if I did, I hope that I'd keep my feet on the ground and help the people that I would help now if I could.
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