States Learned from UIGEA
Wednesday, August 18th, 2010Many states are working with gambling laws to bring in the revenue they need. It is one of the few viable options when it comes to bringing in millions of dollars consistently. The problem with other industries is that they offer much lower revenue and it isn’t consistent. Gambling on the other hand, if used properly is going to provide billions of dollars over the next few years. States are setting up new casino locations for full service gambling throughout their borders. One lesson they learned was that if they don’t provide gambling, then neighboring states will. One of the biggest mistakes regarding gambling was made by the US. The US instituted the UIGEA back in 2006 in an effort to ban online gambling. Did it cause people to stop gambling? No—in fact all it did was cause US gamblers to move to offshore gambling locales and in turn channeled millions of dollars out of the country. State legislators watched the mistake and are hardly itching to make the same one. It could cost them irreplaceable income streams.
Because of the problems the federal government had due to trying to ban online gambling, states are taking notes. They want to be able to institute online gambling law but still minimize the problems that come along with it. It may take some time to flesh out rules due to the intricacies of the market. Gambling is lucrative—that’s the reality and there are billions of dollars at stake if states don’t take advantage of it. In the end, it may be that legalizing gambling may bring more than a few positive results. Not only will states have millions of dollars but they also will be well attuned to negotiating. Legislators have negotiated for years over gambling law—there are the obvious opposing sides, but there are also smaller debates within the issue. How should be gambling be regulated? What specific laws need to be instituted? Are those laws applicable to every state, or should they be modified depending on the state’s individual needs? Questions like these have to be answered before true gambling regulation comes about and is effective.

