Lottery is a gamble where participants pay for a ticket, select a group of numbers or have machines randomly spit out numbers, and win prizes if enough of their numbers match those drawn by the machine. While there are plenty of psychological and financial reasons not to play, there’s a big reason why people do—they love the idea of winning a huge prize.

The fact is that the odds of winning a lottery prize aren’t much better than those for a coin flip or rolling a dice. But lottery players’ dreams of instant riches are fueled by eye-popping jackpots, which have become more common than ever, thanks to higher interest rates and other factors.

Super-sized jackpots also drive ticket sales by generating headline-grabbing news, bringing in more potential players. And the money from those tickets ends up in state coffers, where it’s earmarked for a variety of purposes, from highway work to education and gambling addiction programs.

So what gives? In part, it’s that human beings have a hard time understanding risk when the stakes are high. “Human beings are hardwired to see things that have a very, very low chance of occurring as very probable,” an economics professor at the College of the Holy Cross told NPR in 2010. This includes winning the lottery, with its promise of quick riches and little effort.

While a jackpot is certainly an attractive draw, the lottery’s real profits come from a steady stream of smaller wins that add up over time. It’s also in the lottery’s best interest to keep players coming back, which means keeping jackpots growing and enticing people with new games like video poker and keno.

Some states even encourage multiple-ticket purchases, which increases the chances of a win. And while these strategies can make the game seem more fair, they’re also unfair to those who can’t afford to spend big bucks on tickets.

Many of the money outside your winnings comes from a commission for the retailer and the overhead cost of running the lottery system, including workers who design scratch-off tickets, record live lottery drawing events, keep websites up to date and help you after a win. States have complete control over how they use these funds, but the money often goes toward infrastructure and social services. For example, Minnesota puts lottery funds into the Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund for water quality regulations, while Pennsylvania has used its lottery dollars to support transportation subsidies for the elderly.