Massachusetts senator pitches new tax rate for online sportsbooks
Massachusetts State Senator John Keenan got a chance to plead the case for his bill to increase restrictions on online sports betting platforms in a forum at the State House on 26 March.
SD 1657, known as the Bettor Health Act, includes several measures like increasing taxes on sports betting revenues from 20% to 51% to match states like New York, banning advertising of sports betting during sports events and clarifying the language that sports betting advertisers can use.
One of the most significant changes would be bans on in-play betting and prop bets. College sports prop betting is already banned.
The bill also proposes an increase in the amount sportsbooks must contribute to the Commonwealth’s Public Health Trust Fund.
There are also measures to limit how much people can spend without affordability checks, to require sportsbooks to provide anonymous data on betting activities for problem gambling research and to get the Massachusetts Gaming Commission to investigate the links between suicide and problem gambling.
Keenan likened online sports betting to the opioid crisis as he pitched the bill, saying, “if we don’t see the similarities, we’re going to find ourselves again so far behind trying so hard to create an infrastructure to address it.”
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