Ethical question: What would you do if...

[KenWittlief]

Originally Posted by Tom Bottiglieri

I was just thinking about something similar the other night. My friend's mom bought me a powerball lotto ticket for my 18th b-day. I was thinking if I won I'd give her a small portion of it, because my winnings were directly linked to her.

a lottery ticket has to be the strangest thing to give to someone for a present, esp someone you are not closely related to. There are two possible outcomes:

1. The ticket is worthless. (You gave someone a worthless present) or

2. The ticket is worth tens of millions of dollars. You just gave someone tens of millions of dollars for a birthday present, more money than you will ever have in your entire life, and they are under no obligation to share it with you.

Either way its

BTW, if you received $1M when you were 16, it would be plenty to buy a nice house near a major university, put yourself all the way through college at a reasonable pace (taking a year off between degrees) and getting your Phd

and still having plently of capitol left to start off a professional career in style

that is, as long as nobody knows you have it - otherwise you would end up giving most of it away to friends and family

[Bill_Hancoc]

I prolly wouldnt tell anybody at first cause knowing my friends it would cause a big fight (both verbally and physically) over the cap and whose can it was...i would prolly claim the money, tell the person who bought the can about winning the money and then split it 50/50 with the person who purchased the can in the first place...
If i won it at work or a team meeting where the team or my job paid for it i would probably give maybe 1/3 back to the team but i dont think my job would get any unless they were about to make a bargin with me for some type of raise...even so i dont think they would get any...cuase i would essentially be paying them back for all the work ive ever done for them and i dont like doing that type of work for free

[JoeXIII'007]

$1 million is still a penny shy of $999,999.99, so first I would look at it, take a drink, and put the cap back on, but I wouldn't finish the drink by the end of the meeting to be able to take it home.

Then there, I would call whoever to get the 9 hundred thousand something bucks into my bank account. Then to breach the million buck mark, I would sell my current house, and all of its belongings, everything, to start off with a clean slate. I would keep my bike though, and some raggity clothes.

Biking downtown looking poor I would seek a real estate company who knows where some open land is, purchase that land (with the guy looking at me wonder being in the poor man's clothes), then design, build, a small but awesome house and equip it with a high end media center computer and a flat panel LCD display, some modern furniture, and overall and efficient designed house made of brick. The T1 line would be ordered, and a small server installed in the house for my own web space. WIRED! to say the least.

I still see at least $500,000 being left over, so I'll start a business dealing in whatever and watch it grow and give jobs to a poor community badly needing it. I'd offer scholarships to the smart but who were denied scholarships due to some odd thing.

And with whatever leftover money there is, I would buy up a lot of those KOPs, some good material, and machines. What to do with all that:

Gundam anyone???



-Joe

[Melissa Nute]

Seeing how after taxes it would be about 660k...

Pay off debt (~15k in student loans by the time I finish)
Buy a house (~300k)
Buy a new car (~50k)
Go all out on my Disney Wedding (100k instead of the budgetted 15k)

Then invest/save the rest for the future, so my children wont have to worry about college.

[KenWittlief]

Everyone click on Meli's photo

then join in and harmonize

"I would buy you a green shirt

(but not a real green shirt, thats cruel! :^)

[artdutra04]

The funny thing is that if you're suddenly a millionaire, your life - at least socially - will suck. Everyone will always come to you asking for money, or for this, or for that, or for a ride in a limousine. If I won something like this, I'd do what Ken would do - keep it a secret from everyone else.

I wouldn't let anyone else know I won, simply because people would stop being friends with you because of who you are, but instead of how much money you have. The only time I would ever tell anyone is if I was in long-term serious relationship, but even then I wouldn't say a thing until I know she loved me and not my money.

Instead of spending it all (or even a large portion of it), I'd find some way to put the money to use. It's not everyday that one comes into a large fortune, so I'd start looking for gaps or niches in the market where even more money can be made. A great example is in either transportation or energy. As our oil supplies peak, and then slowly decline, there is a ton of potential to make a ton of money, as well as find a new solution thats better for the environment and improves our quality of life.

If you can establish yourself quickly, and offer a cheap, cost-efficient solution to the oil-shortage crisis that starts to become widely adopted, your million dollars is now ten million. And then one hundred million. And then one billion. And beyond.

With enough money, you can conduct more and more research to find even more solutions to problems in the world. With money, you can give back to the world, and make the world a better place. With money, the possibilities are endless.

I want to do something in life, instead of just watching life come and go and being another average person in a planet of six billion. I want to be one of the ones that dares to take some risk, to blaze a new path, to be a leader, to change the world. Maybe you'll think I'm crazy for thinking this, as you wouldn't be the first one. But to quote Apple Computers, "... the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do."

[Bill Moore]

Originally Posted by artdutra04

. . .I'd do what Ken would do - keep it a secret from everyone else.

Best decision when quickly coming into riches.

Originally Posted by artdutra04

I wouldn't let anyone else know I won, simply because people would stop being friends with you because of who you are, but instead of how much money you have.

Don't forget, money not only changes the folks around a person, but often changes the person themself. Look at big lottery winners, there are many stories about how large sums have changed their lives for the worse. (i.e., going into debt against future annuity payments, etc.)

A person must be well grounded with their beliefs and who they are before they receive such large sums, or they often will fritter it away. Don't forget Ken's earlier statement that he earned over a million in his career already. Everyone on this board will similarly earn over a million in their careers. (Consider that working 20 years at $50,000/year is $1 million.)

Originally Posted by artdutra04

I want to do something in life, instead of just watching life come and go and being another average person in a planet of six billion. I want to be one of the ones that dares to take some risk, to blaze a new path, to be a leader, to change the world. Maybe you'll think I'm crazy for thinking this, as you wouldn't be the first one. But to quote Apple Computers, "... the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do."

I think if you talk with mentors of FIRST teams, you will find that they have changed the world. Not all changes happen like the personal computer revolution, which can be traced back to a group of garage based enthusiasts. Many changes are smaller, yet very significant in peoples lives, and the improvements often do not receive the public recognition that they deserve. In fact, for researchers, the improvements may occur, or be recognized, many years after their careers have finished -- consider the Nobel Prizes.

[Gabe]

I you would give the robotics team $20,000 a year for registration, travel fees, hotels, extra regionals and the robot, the team would be in a very comfortable position and would have its continued existence assured. $1,000,000 divided by $20,000 is 50 years of robotics, which is very nice indeed! Imagine having the team still be there half a century later...