Life just got a bit easier for one lucky Illinois Lottery player who struck it big while playing a $10 scratch-off with the promise of monthly payouts.
According to the Illinois Lottery, the big winner hit the jackpot prize while playing “20 Years of Cash,” a ticket that offers players a chance at winning $25,000 a month for 20 years.
Only three of the life-changing jackpot prizes were up for grabs and the lucky winner snagged the last one
20 Years of Cash players have a 1 in 3.52 chance of winning a prize but jackpot odds were much higher at 1 in 4,800,000, according to the Illinois Lottery.
But winning was most likely the easy part for the lucky lotto player who now has to decide if they want to receive the $6,000,000 prize in annual payments of $300,000 for twenty years, or as a one-time payment of $3,600,000, in lieu of the annuity.
According to Nerdwallet’s Lottery Tax Calculator, if the lotto winner chose the one-time payment of $3,600,000, they would end up taking home about $2,557,00, after paying about $864,000 in federal taxes and $178,200 in state taxes.
Things would work out a bit differently if they ended up choosing the annual payments. After taxes, they would end up taking home about $213,000 per year after paying $72,000 in federal taxes and about $14,000 in state taxes annually.
