California is one of, if not the most, cash-strapped states in America. Their overspending has already raised questions across the country about what California will do about the financial crisis facing the country. And despite reports from Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger that there is no financial crisis in California, everybody knows there is one.
Seeing as how this is the case, it seems as if California has no choice but to license online poker. It’s the only way that California is going to get out of the financial mess they’re in because they can’t just start taxing residents like crazy. And regulating online poker for state revenue isn’t exactly out of the question for the Golden State since has already dove into the gambling world before.
California licenses horseracing through Internet services like YouBet and TVG to bring revenue into the state already. Plus residents of California do an estimated $800 million worth of gambling over the Internet as it is meaning that’s money the state isn’t getting any tax money from. So licensing poker themselves would prevent some of this outflow of untaxed money to offshore sites.
And for those who think the UIGEA will prevent California from licensing, think again. The state is definitely in the right to license poker as they see fit under their state rights. So the real question here is when will California become the first state to begin licensing poker.
There is no real way to predict when this will happen, but I assume legislators will try to get something going before the end of the year since the Golden State will want to get in on the online poker deal before the UIGEA is repealed. Plus around 10 million people already play poker in California’s cardrooms so moving the game online isn’t such a leap.