There were trouble signs about the sports betting venture from the beginning, writes ConnCarroll. 'Maybe the district’s residents are getting the best deal here. Sports betting is essentially a tax on lower-income residents.'
hen Virginia decided to legalize digital sports betting in 2020, it did what any sensible government would do: It allowed privately owned sports betting applications to compete among each other to deliver the best product, and then, it taxed the revenue of those companies.
Problem is, before a government can tax a company’s revenues, there must be some revenues to begin with. And for 2021, the company the district contracted with to create the city’s sports betting app, GamBetDC, lost money. There were trouble signs about the venture from the beginning. Not only did the district elect to grant one company a gambling monopoly in the district, but it also awarded that monopoly on a no-bid basis. There wasn’t even a competition between companies to get the monopoly!