Tuesday, January 1, 2030

Welcome to my blog!

Welcome to Stose's Price is Right blog!

Greetings! Welcome to my little slice of the Internet. You're probably here either to read about my experience as a contestant on The Price is Right or to read my Ultimate Strategy Guide to all the games. All the links you need are below. You are welcome to comment as you desire, just be respectful and avoid swearing. Thanks!

My experience as a contestant

Friday, January 5, 2024

Guide to Taxes for California-based Game Shows

Disclaimer: While I am a weird person who likes and studies taxes for fun, I am not a tax professional. Please check with a tax pro if you need specific advice. 

Welcome to my game show tax guide! I've met a lot of people in the last year who have won things on game shows (congrats!!) and hopefully this will help you determine what taxes you must file and pay. A couple of key points:

  • As implied by the title, this guide is for game shows that tape in California. The concepts should be similar for game shows that tape in other states, but you will have to check with those states for the details.
  • This is only for US citizens. I don't know enough about foreign taxes to make a guide for non-US citizens who win something on a US game show.
  • When I say "winnings," I'm only referring to the winnings you actually kept. You do not have to report or pay taxes on prizes you turned down.
  • All references to specific forms, schedules, and lines are based on 2023 forms (i.e. the return you fill out in early 2024). They could move to different places in other years.
  • I'm assuming you lived in one state for all of 2023. Part year residency situations are beyond the scope of this guide.
Overview of returns to fill out:
Here are the returns you'll have to fill out, based on where you lived in 2023 (or whatever year you won things on the game show):
  • If you lived in California, you only have to fill out two returns: a federal return and a CA resident return.
  • If you lived outside CA in a state that doesn't have income taxes, then you need to fill out two returns: a federal return and a CA non-resident return.
  • If you lived outside CA in a state that does have income taxes, then you need to fill out three forms: a federal return, a CA non-resident return, and a standard resident return for whatever state you lived in.

To start: No matter where you live, and whether you do taxes by hand or by software, you should start by filling out your federal 1040.

Federal taxes

If you won $600 or more, you will receive a 1099-MISC form from your game show that shows how much you won. You don't have to attach this form to your 1040 as the game show will send the IRS a copy of it. If you won less than $600, you probably won't get such a form. You still must report and pay taxes on your winnings. All income is taxable, whether the source of the income reported it to the IRS or not. 

The amount you won is considered "ordinary income," meaning it's taxed the same as if you earned it at a job, interest on a bank account, or anything else that's taxable at a normal rate. However, do note you don't have to pay Social Security or Medicare tax on your game show winnings.

If you do taxes yourself, you must report your winnings on Schedule 1, line 8i ("Prizes and Awards.")


If you use tax software to do your taxes, then look in your software for an "other income" or an "unusual income" section and input the amount you won from the game show in the prizes and awards field. I personally don't use tax software, so I don't know exactly where to look in any specific program.

State taxes if you live in California

If you live in California, then you didn't have any taxes taken out on your winnings in advance. You should fill things out in this order:

  1. Start by doing your federal tax form, including your game show winnings as explained above.
  2. Then complete your CA return. There's really no more complexity than normal, because your winnings were included in your federal tax calculations, and thus they will be automatically "transferred" to your CA return as income there. Fill out your CA return as normal; you will likely owe taxes because you haven't paid them yet on the prizes you won.

State taxes if you don't live in California


If you don't live in CA, you should fill things out in this order:
  1. Start by doing your federal tax form, including your game show winnings as explained above.
  2. Fill out a CA non-resident tax return. Even if you didn't win enough to have estimated CA tax taken out of your winnings, CA still wants to know about your winnings and take taxes on them. More details are provided below.
  3. If your state has income taxes, fill out your state income tax return third. You should be able to get a credit for at least some of the taxes you paid to CA. Some details are below.
Details on the CA non-resident tax return.
Hoo boy. If you fill it out yourself, this has at least two parts: first, fill out CA form 540NR schedule CA, then fill out CA form 540NR. Both can be found by going to this website:


and search for form "540NR" (without the quotes):

The two forms you need are highlighted below:

Note that you'll need to provide your e-mail address to get schedule CA. You should get the form within seconds after you provide it. I don't know why they do that, but they do. Also note you may need some other forms if you had capital gains or other situations you can find by looking at those results.

As mentioned, start with schedule CA. In essence, you will be transferring your income line by line from your federal tax to column A (the left most column), and then stating in column E (the right most column) how much of that money came from CA. If you didn't live in CA and your only CA based income is from the game show, then column E should remain empty except for the prizes and awards section. Here's an example with made up numbers:



Notice column E is blank except for the game show winnings. Also notice the "subtractions and additions" columns--for each column, you'll need to look up whether federal law differs from CA law in terms of how the money is taxed. Usually it's no different, but you can check on the CA website (search for "CA FTB conformity" [without the quotes] for details.)

After schedule CA is done, fill out form 540NR. This is a pretty straightforward form (by US tax standards); just follow the instructions, transferring the data from schedule CA where appropriate. The only catch is whether you had estimated taxes taken out of your winnings. If you won $1500 or more, then CA required you to pay 7% of your winnings in estimated tax, either by taking it out of the cash you won or, if you didn't win enough cash, making you send a check or similar to the game show before you could get your prizes. This 7% is probably above what you actually owe, so you'll likely get money back from CA in that case (I got about 2/3 of my payment back). In any event, you either have received or will receive a form 592-B that indicates exactly how much you won and how much was taken out. The key part of that form is part IV:


That amount goes into form 540NR, line 83:


Again, if you won less than $1500, you didn't make any tax pre-payment, you won't get a 592-B form, and line 83 should remain blank. 

The rest of the form is math. But after you're done filling that form out, you might not be done yet...

Claiming credit in your home state
If you live in a state that taxes your income, then the last step is to fill out your state's income tax form, and you can likely get credit for some or all of the taxes you had to pay in California. Every state is different in the details, but look for a section about taxes paid to another state. For example, in Utah, this is done on a separate form that looks like this:


Don't be surprised if, weeks or months after filing, you get a letter from your home state asking you to send in your CA return. It's nothing to be scared of, just send in your CA return to prove you paid the taxes to them you claim you paid.

Conclusion

Game show taxes aren't easy, but they are doable. I haven't used tax software to do taxes when game show winnings were involved, but if you have, please let me know how it went! Any questions/corrections/etc. are more than welcome. Thanks for reading!

Wednesday, September 25, 2019

The Ultimate Price is Right Strategy Guide: Vend-O-Price

Vend-O-Price

Rules
A prize is shown. Three shelves are shown, each of which has a grocery item. The top shelf has the cheapest item while the bottom shelf has the most expensive item. Then each shelf is revealed to have a certain number of its featured item. The contestant must determine which shelf is the most expensive shelf.

Random fact
For the first couple of playings of this game, they used the old Penny Ante sound effect when revealing the grocery products. You can see the debut playing of the game here:


Win-loss record
  • Actual (seasons 44-47): 34-33 (50.75%)
  • What it would be by random chance: 1/3 (33.33%)
The correct shelf to choose was...(seasons 44-47)
  • The top shelf: 18 playings (26.87%)
  • The middle shelf: 27 playings (40.30%)
  • The bottom shelf: 22 playings (32.84%)
Strategy
Much as this is a lame way to end the blog, know the prices of the grocery items. But one thing that can help is to think of this game in terms of ratios; for example, if one shelf has twice as many of a product as another shelf, then the item on the shelf with fewer items must be worth at least twice as much as the item on the shelf with more items to be more expensive.

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

The Ultimate Price is Right Strategy Guide: 2 for the Price of 1

2 for the Price of 1

Rules
Two prizes are shown, a large prize and a prize with three digits in its price. Two possibilities are shown for each digit in the three digit prize; the contestant can choose one of the digits to be revealed for free. They must correctly choose the other two digits to win both prizes.

Random fact
This game is occasionally played for cars. Here's an example of one such playing:

Win-loss record
  • Actual (seasons 29-47): 70-85 (45.16%)
  • What it would be by random chance: 1/4 (25%)
How often each combination was correct (seasons 40-47)
  • All 3 numbers on top were right: 2 playings (2.99%) [none since season 42]
  • 2 numbers on top and 1 on the bottom were right: 33 playings (49.25%)
  • 1 number on top and 2 on the bottom were right: 32 playings (47.76%)
  • All 3 numbers on the bottom were right: 0 playings (0%)
Strategy
If a 0 is an option for the last digit, choose the second digit for free. The last digit has been 0 in every playing of this game except one since season 44, and in that playing, 0 wasn't an option for the last digit. So if 0 is a choice for the last digit, that is NOT the one you want to choose for free. Choose the second digit for free, choose 0 for the last digit, and then you only have to know the hundreds digit of the prize. Regarding the hundreds digit, no prize in this game has been worth less than $500 since season 41, so if you see a choice that's less than 5 for the first digit, it's wrong.

That one playing where 0 wasn't a choice for the last digit was the very last playing of season 47, where the choices were 2 and 5. The 2 was correct. While I hope that was a one-time aberration, my advice is that if 0 is not a choice for the last digit, then you should choose the last digit for free instead of the second digit.

Finally, make sure that your final price has at least one digit from the top and one from the bottom.

Monday, September 23, 2019

The Ultimate Price is Right Strategy Guide: Triple Play

Triple Play

Rules
Three cars are shown. For the first car, two prices are shown; the contestant must choose which price is closest to the actual retail price of the car without going over. If they are correct, they move on to the second car. That car has three prices; the contestant must again choose the price that is the closest to the price of the car without going over. If they are correct, they go to the last car, where they have four choices and must choose the one that is closest to the car's actual retail price without going over. If they are correct, they win all three cars; if they are wrong at any time, they win nothing.

Random fact
Triple Play is the only game on the show that has prizes that aren't always described by George. This is because the car is only described by George just before the contestant gives their guess; if the contestant doesn't reach the second or third car, its/their description/s is/are not read.

Win-loss record
  • Actual (seasons 29-47): 13-74 (14.94%)
  • What it would be by random chance: 1/24 (4.17%)
The correct price to choose was...(seasons 40-47)
First car
  • The cheaper price: 7 playings (22.58%)
  • The more expensive price: 24 playings (77.42%)
Second car*
  • The cheapest price: 6 playings (31.58%)
  • The middle price: 10 playings (52.63%)
  • The most expensive price: 3 playings (15.79%)
Third car*
  • The cheapest price: 7 playings (70%)
  • The second cheapest price: 0 playings (0%)
  • The second most expensive price: 3 playings (30%)
  • The most expensive price: 0 playings (0%)
* Only counts playings the contestant reached that car.

Strategy
First car
Select the more expensive price unless you're absolutely sure the cheaper price is correct; the cheaper price hasn't been correct more than once in a season since season 40, and in seasons 44, 45, and 47, the cheaper price was never right.

Second and third cars
Know the prices. The middle price has been the most likely to be correct for the second car, but that's not enough data to be able to confidently say you should pick it. Ditto for the third car--yes, the cheapest price has been correct 70% of the time, but the sample size is far too small to confidently say that's really a pattern and not just a coincidence.

Saturday, September 21, 2019

The Ultimate Price is Right Strategy Guide: Time i$ Money

Time i$ Money

Rules
Five grocery products are shown as are three platforms with the amounts $0-$2.99, $3-$5.99, and $6+ written on them. The contestant has 10 seconds to move the grocery products on to the correct platforms based on their prices. If they are right, they win $20,000. If they are wrong, the contestant can make changes, but the $20,000 starts counting down to $0. The contestant wins however much money is showing on the money meter when they have the groceries in the correct positions.

Random fact
This game was completely refurbished and the rules changed in season 43; all the stats in this article are based on the refurbished version only. You can see the debut playing with the original rules here:


Win-loss record
  • Actual (seasons 43-47): 4-72 (5.26%)
  • What it would be by random chance: 1/81 (1.23%)

The correct number of items on each platform was...(seasons 43-47)
  • 1/1/3: 7 playings (9.21%)
  • 1/2/2: 23 playings (30.26%)
  • 1/3/1: 5 playings (6.58%)
  • 2/1/2: 24 playings (31.58%)
  • 2/2/1: 16 playings (21.05%)
  • 3/1/1: 1 playing (1.32%)

The correct placement of each product was...(seasons 43-47)
  Original
  position*    <=$2.99  $3-$5.99   $6+  
Left-most       24.68%   45.45%   29.87%
2nd from left   32.47%   16.88%   50.65%
Center          20.78%   40.26%   38.96%
2nd from right  40.26%   27.27%   32.47%
Right-most      38.96%   29.87%   31.17%
* From the audience's point of view.


Strategy
Mostly know the prices, but a couple of tips can help you here:
  • DO NOT LOOK AT THE AUDIENCE!! You need to make as many guesses as you can; looking at the audience only slows you down.
  • There is always at least one item on each platform. Do not leave any platforms empty.
  • The combinations where one platform has 3 products are far less frequently correct than the ones where no platform has more than 2 products. Don't go for a 3/1/1, 1/3/1, or 1/1/3 combination unless you're reasonably sure of the three products that you think are in the same range.

Friday, September 20, 2019

The Ultimate Price is Right Strategy Guide: 3 Strikes

3 Strikes

Rules
A car is shown. A bag is shown; three balls painted red (the "strikes") are put into the bag and five balls, each of which has a number in the price of the car, are also put in the bag. The contestant draws numbers one at a time from the bag. If they draw a number, they must tell Drew which position in the price of the car the number is. If they are correct, the digit is lit up; if not, the ball is put back in the bag for the contestant to draw later. The contestant wins if they light up the entire price of the car before they draw the three strikes in the bag.

Random fact
This game was given a serious overhaul in season 47 to look like something you would see at a baseball stadium. As someone who lived in Boston for 14 years, went to many games at Fenway Park, and even once announced an inning of baseball on the radio, I love the look. You can see it here:


Win-loss record
  • Actual (seasons 38*-47): 9-33 (21.43%)
  • What it would be by random chance:
    • If you know the price: Exactly 3/8 (37.5%)
    • If you don't know the price at all**: Approx. 14.24%
    • If you know only the first digit of the price**: Approx. 20.79% 
* Starting at season 38 as that's when the current rules of the game stabilized.
** Based on simulating the game 10 million times. The simulation chose things randomly but played perfect strategy; for example, it didn't try the same digit in the same place twice and if you tried four digits in one spot and they were all wrong, it would know to place the fifth digit there.

What was the last digit of the car's price? (seasons 40-47)
  • 0: 0 playings (0%)
  • 1: 5 playings (14.71%)
  • 2: 8 playings (23.53%)
  • 3: 6 playings (17.65%)
  • 4: 2 playings (5.88%)
  • 5: 2 playings (5.88%)
  • 6: 7 playings (20.59%)
  • 7: 3 playings (8.82%)
  • 8: 0 playings (0%)
  • 9: 1 playing (2.94%)
Strategy
Ask for a different game. After Drew is done laughing, pray you get really, really, really lucky. I don't have much here except that you should keep very close track of the picks you've made throughout the game so you don't repeat picks. Also, you should assume the last number is NOT 0, 5, or 9.