A viral Facebook meme claiming that we can end poverty by splitting the Powerball is actually really wrong.
Outside of being an alleged Powerball scam, whatever you do, don’t believe that viral Powerball post that your friends and family members are sharing on Facebook, claiming the Powerball jackpot, which is now at $1.4 billion, could solve poverty in the United States.
The math in the post does not quite work.
WOW!!!!!!! #ShareThis!
Posted by Livesosa on Sunday, January 10, 2016
The post claims if you divided $1.3 billion among the United States population, then everyone would receive $4.33 million. But, $1,300,000,000/300,000,000 actually equals $4.33, NOT $4.33 million.
So you could basically by four McDoubles from McDonalds if the Powerball winnings were divided up among the United States population.
While the Facebook poster may have fooled some Facebook users. The most has been shared well over a million times.
Don’t believe everything you read on Facebook.
