00:00OK, so we know that, you know, across the country, we're seeing more money bet on sports than anything recreational around the world.
00:09It's just happening. Now, Pennsylvania is one of those states that started off legalizing sports betting with what most would consider a pretty reasonable tax rate on on that.
00:20But with them seeing what's going on in a lot of other places, it feels like, Sam, they're the next shoe to drop, so to speak, as far as trying to get more money out of consumers in a new sports betting tax.
00:34Yeah, Pennsylvania actually legalized sports betting before states were even allowed to legalize it.
00:39They did it before the Supreme Court repealed PASPA. And at the time, they imposed a tax on sports books that wasn't just considered reasonable.
00:46It was considered sky high for sports books. It was 36 percent at the time, which still stands today as one of the highest taxes, although New York has gone beyond that with 51 percent.
00:56And states like Illinois and Ohio have raised their rates as well.
00:59But now Pennsylvania is coming back to the drawing table amid a gap in budget discussions with the governor.
01:06Governor Josh Shapiro and Pennsylvania lawmakers, I'm told, are discussing ways to bridge that budget gap, which revolve around increasing sports betting taxes, as well as taxes on iGaming and iCasino products in Pennsylvania as well.
01:20Now, this is really interesting because we've seen a number of states increase their tax rates over the past years.
01:26We've seen Ohio, you know, double their rate only a year after they introduced it.
01:31And then most recently, Illinois, which went from a 15 percent flat rate to 40 percent for the highest operators like DraftKings and FanDuel.
01:39And then again this year with the 25 cent to 50 cent per bet fee tax, which operators then in turn passed down to Illinois customers.
01:50And I'm told that if Pennsylvania does not just a per bet fee tax or anything like that, if they raise tax rates at all again this year, sports books will be inclined like they did in Illinois to then pass that down to customers.
02:05So you have Illinois customers now have to play give 25 cents or 50 cents per bet to the customers to the sports books in Illinois.
02:16And that's going to get passed down again in Pennsylvania if this kind of thing happens.
02:20So it's kind of a threat they're putting out there.
02:23We'll see what comes to shake on the sports betting front.
02:26But it's another kind of, you know, crazy discussion in the legislature right now.
02:30Hopefully it doesn't happen.
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