It's a triumph of regulation that he got his money. It would have been very natural for CBS to cite technical difficulties or find some other way to change the rules of the game, but US game shows in this era were terrified of the FCC, who were given strong powers to enforce fairness in game shows after some frauds in the 50s [0].
Those laws are still on the books, of course, but I expect game show producers have got better at working around them in the small print, while regulators haven't kept up.
They still were 20 years later, and probably still are today. In Episode 6 of the Jeopardy! podcast[0], a former contestant coordinator recalls an instance where Ken Jennings, deep into his 2004 run and getting comfortable in the studio and with staff, was brought behind the board to check his appearance on monitors. But being "backstage" was a big red flag and several people had conniptions.
Game show producers want you to win big. Big winners are great advertisement. Management has a different idea of course, but management also understands that big winners bring in viewers and so they want to have big enough winners but not too big. Nobody wants to be accused of cheating as that is a scandal that can kill the game show.
Right, the show needs some winners. Management and producers might go a step further and realise that a charismatic underdog winning dramatically from hopeless circumstances would bring in even more viewers - perhaps something could be done to help that happen?
Oh, good grief. In two comments you've gone from "game show producers don't want to pay out the money contestants win" to, after bluGill points out that game shows want contestants to win big, say "Of course! If anything, game show producers might even skew things to help charismatic underdogs win!". I mean, really.
I haven't changed anything! It's right there in the Wikipedia article - the 1950s frauds were in fact mainly about rigging the shows for entertainment value, ensuring the right contestants won.
The FCC doesn't (didn't?) like the shows being rigged that way, which is why The $64,000 Question went off the air. It also doesn't like the shows being rigged in the network's favour, which is why this episode of Press Your Luck continued to the end despite the producers' misgivings.
I am well aware of the 1950s game show scandals. That the scandals happened 70 years ago is not very relevant to your claim that game show producers today are
* all super-crooked, with only fear of the FCC preventing them from repeating the scandals
* determined to not pay rightful winners, and
* willing to put the thumb on the scales to help others to win undeservingly
At some point, going through life with such cynicism is counterproductive.
Those laws are still on the books, of course, but I expect game show producers have got better at working around them in the small print, while regulators haven't kept up.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1950s_quiz_show_scandals