The tax bite is not the only issue to worry about when playing the Powerball lottery. Maximizing your chances at winning what is now a record-breaking payout would mean buying more tickets. "The investment you make by playing multiple games also goes up, and the payoffs in a real lottery vary," said Lew Lefton, senior academic professional in the School of Mathematics, and assistant dean of IT and associate vice president for research in the College of Sciences. In other words, investing more money into a higher number of tickets may not always be worth the expense.