Business

A ‘Mega’ dose of reality

Perhaps Ben Bernanke — the world’s foremost central banker — ought to have spent some time standing in line at a Queens deli to buy a ticket for the $640 million Mega Millions jackpot to get a real read on the economy.

There he would have met a sampling of New Yorkers and would have gotten an earful about how his zero-interest-rate policy has affected their balance sheets.

Sure, $640 million is a mind-numbing sum — enough to drive tens of millions from across the economic spectrum to shell out a $1 a ticket for a chance at a windfall that approaches the annual take of a hedge-fund maven.

As the clock ticked down to the final hour that the tickets could be purchased, the government reported that Americans’ personal savings rate dropped to 3.7 percent in February, down a full percentage point from last December, and the lowest rate in more than two years.

A big jump in consumer spending (up 0.8 percent) fueled the decline in savings, but so too did the continued stagnation in wages, which only rose a quarter as fast as spending. Adjusted for taxes and inflation, wages actually fell in February by 0.1 percent, the third straight monthly decline.

Bottom line, whether Americans are spending on lottery tickets or iPads or just filling the gas tank, they are dipping into savings at a time when they should be rebuilding their nest eggs.

Which brings us back to Professor Ben — a man one could safely bet has never purchased a lottery ticket in his life, but who rolls the dice on the economy every day.

Let’s assume the Mega winner nets about $350 million after taxes, and wants to save his windfall by putting it into two-year Treasuries. At current rates, he would be earning about $950,000 in annual interest, or about the same as a mid-level investment banker’s take-home pay.

A select few have won the Bernanke lottery. Hundreds of millions more Americans are left holding increasingly worthless pieces of paper.