As the Powerball jackpot continues to swell, even celebrities are getting in on the action.
With just hours until Wednesday's drawing, "Chicago Fire" star Taylor Kinney stopped in to a local 7-Eleven to pick up not just a ticket for him, but for his co-workers too.
"I figured I'd buy them for people at work, I'll put it up and then we'll split the money," Kinney said.
Already at $650 million after no grand prize winner was drawn Saturday night, the jackpot for Wednesday night rose to $700 million on Tuesday — the second largest in U.S. history.
No one has matched all six balls in more than two months, so the jackpot has grown after every drawing. It sometimes grows in between drawings.
If Kinney should win, what would he do with the money?
"I'll buy a lot of cupcakes," he said.
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The odds of winning the giant prize is one in 292.2 million. Tom Rietz, a professor at the University of Iowa who researches probabilities, says one way to think about it is to envision the 324 million U.S. residents. Your chance of winning is roughly comparable to being that one lucky person out of the entire population, with everyone else losing.
The jackpot is listed as $700 million, but that refers to the annuity option, doled out in 30 payments over 29 years. Nearly all winners favor the cash option, which pays significantly less. For the current jackpot, the cash prize would be $443.3 million.
Powerball is played in 44 states as well as Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
