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SportsTranscript
00:00For people who are betting on the Masters in North Carolina, they're going to be watching our show right now and wondering if this story that you posted over at Legal Sports Report is going to come true.
00:09Like a lot of other states, not all, but most, they're looking to raise taxes on sports betting this year and next year.
00:17North Carolina is the state that we're set to discuss.
00:20What is the exact rate that they're looking to lift this by, Pat, and is this something realistic for that state?
00:26Yeah, so North Carolina, of course, got online sports betting off the ground last spring.
00:32It seemed it's seemingly going well for them down there.
00:34They've got eight operators and it's, you know, bringing in almost 135 million dollars in tax revenue, which is great.
00:42It's going to the UNC, a number of causes, but also going to UNC system, not UNC and NC State, but a bunch of other smaller schools, 13 smaller schools, to be exact.
00:55It is currently at 18 percent, the tax rate, and lawmakers are now, they've introduced legislation to move it up to 36 percent, doubling it.
01:05And that is kind of just, they want to bring in more money.
01:09You know, a lot of these states are looking at states like New York that has a 51 percent rate and saying, wait, we can make a lot more money off of this than we are.
01:18And I think a lot of that, too, is when a lot of these legislations were originally being talked about and passed, a lot of the estimates were very high.
01:27And, you know, some of the states are not seeing the actual revenue come in at the estimated level.
01:33So they're saying, OK, let's bring it up a little bit.
01:34So what's kind of unique about this one is it would increase the money going to the UNC school system, and it would also eventually send money to UNC and NC State, given a provision in there that those teams play at least four games against in-state UNC school system schools, basketball games.
01:57So to qualify for the extra money.
01:59So there is that.
02:01Is this realistic?
02:02I think anything can happen.
02:04You know, we've seen multiple states increase the tax rate from Illinois and Ohio, which we'll talk about Ohio again in a minute.
02:12But then we've also seen a lot of tax rate proposals this year that have fallen short and haven't gained any traction.
02:19You know, we saw Indiana, Michigan, Louisiana, little provisions that would raise the taxes.
02:26Those didn't go anywhere.
02:27Governor Westmore in Maryland proposed doubling the tax rate in his budget.
02:33It didn't go anywhere.
02:34New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has also proposed in his budget to increase sports betting and online casino taxes.
02:41It's not gaining a bunch of traction and has actually faced a lot of backlash.
02:44So, yeah, a lot of states are considering it or have considered it this year and will continue to consider it in future sessions.
02:52But it hasn't gone much, most anywhere.
02:56And so it's going to be questionable if it gains any traction in North Carolina, which we've seen a lot of, like, extra auxiliary sports betting bills the last year in North Carolina.
03:06And it just hasn't, most of them haven't even gone anywhere in a committee.
03:11So it'll be interesting to see if this one does move anywhere.
03:14But, yeah, doubling the tax rate from 18 to 36, nothing to sneeze at.
03:18Certainly something to keep an eye on, though.