Today's Powerball Lottery

I went out and bought tickets to the Powerball lottery this morning. As someone smarter than me once said, the lottery is a tax on stupidity. That is the case when the prize is much less than the odds against winning it. The Powerball today is not in that category. The payoff on the lottery is much greater than the the odds against you. The odds against you is 1 in 146 million and the payoff is $340 million. This is called a positive Expected Value (EV). So even after you pay 1/2 in taxes, you have a 179 to 146 positive EV. So, my lottery ticket purchase was stupid, but not as stupid as it would ordinarily be.