Keeping the two forms distinct reduces ambiguity. Using may have for a past counterfactual situation instead of might have is not only frowned upon by the Panel but can also lead to confusion, since may have is best suited for a different kind of situation: present uncertainty about a past situation. Only a third of the Panel (32 percent) approved of the same sentence with may have replacing might have. In our 2012 survey, 97 percent of the Usage Panelists found the sentence If John Lennon had not been shot, the Beatles might have gotten back together acceptable. Although this usage is common in casual speech, it is considered unacceptable by the majority of the Usage Panel. Since about the 1960s, however, people have started using may have where might have would be expected (as in, If he hadn't tripped, he may have won the race). When referring to a hypothetical or contrary-to-fact situation in the past, rather than an imagined future situation, the verbs are shifted to the remote past: won becomes had won, and might buy becomes might have bought: If I had won the lottery, I might have bought a yacht. Usage Note: May or might? In many situations, the choice between these two verbs can be clarified by remembering that might is the past tense form of may, and that in English, a past tense form is used to refer not just to events that occurred in the past ( She left yesterday), but to hypothetical, counterfactual, or remotely possible situations ( If you left now, you'd get there on time.) Thus, the past tense form might is appropriate in this sentence about a future event that is a remote possibility: If I won the lottery, I might buy a yacht, which contrasts with the present-tense version that indicates an open possibility: If I win the lottery, I may buy a yacht.
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