Yeah that kind of coordination coming from the end of the school year doesn’t make sense. Zooming out a bit it looks like there was just a spike in May 2025. It was all useage of a particular model, OpenAI’s GPT-4o-mini, which barely registers outside of these short periods of high use in March and then May of 2025. I don’t really know what a ‘token’ is so maybe it’s not a 1:1 comparison when useage shifts between different models? Or the data’s bad? Or some particular project used that model a large amount in those specific months?

The US effectively does both: the lotteries are run by the states and total prizes are much less than total ticket sales, generating net revenue for the state. Winnings are taxed like other income, meaning there are federal taxes and in many states state taxes.