Apart from the language, New Zealand and the United States do not too much in common. While the Americans are crazy about football, rugby is New Zealand’s national sport. Generally, all significant parameters, from size to wealth, make America a much greater force in the world. Such a comparison is always important regardless of context, especially nowadays when 20 people have more wealth than 50% of the world. The array of distinctions between the two countries involves casino laws.
The availability of online casinos in the United States as the key difference
Online gambling represents the biggest distinction between the two countries. The growth of the Internet and numerous other online features has significantly increased the appeal for online casino games all over the globe. However, unlike the United States, New Zealand do not benefit much from it. It is because online gambling is not regulated there.
While we’ve witnessed the birth of numerous online NJ casinos in the last couple of years, New Zealand have domestically regulated online establishment to offer to their residents. Instead, the New Zealanders need to play their favorite games at offshore operators. While it widens the range of the gaming possibilities it also increases safety concerns as an individual can only feel 100% secure while playing at a regulated and licensed operator.
Active gambling laws in New Zealand date from 2003
Land-based gambling is a significant source of revenue for New Zealand. The government pays special attention to securing a safe gambling environment for both its residents and the tourists, setting the whole industry at a very high level. The forms of gambling we know today have kind of existed since 1954 when the birth of the Totalisator Agency Board began the process of relaxing the then-existing gambling laws.
Finally, the current gambling laws in this country date from 2003, following the adoption of the Gambling Act and the Racing Act. As per the former act, the Gambling Commission of New Zealand was formed as an independent regulatory body responsible for overseeing gambling across the entire country.
At the moment, New Zealand are home to six land-based casinos, located in the country’s biggest cities such as Auckland, Hamilton, Queenstown, Dunedin, and Christchurch.
The United States relaxed their casino laws in 2011
A major change for the entire US gambling industry occurred in 2011 when the government adjusted the interpretation of the Wire Act. Since then the law separated casino games (including poker) and sports betting. It was the year when all states were allowed to fully legalize online casino sites. New Jersey and Delaware were among the first to do so and others soon followed. Such a different approach to online casino wagering has brought the much-wanted tax revenue in a tough economic climate for the states that have adopted the new niche.
Final words
There are more minor distinctions between the casino laws in the two countries, i.e. the way in which New Zealand treat minimum jackpots. Over there, all slot machines (or pokies how the New Zealanders call them) need to show information on how much someone has played and lost at any time. Nevertheless, the core difference deals with the online gambling regulations. It will be very interesting to see whether New Zealand will change their attitude on this matter because the government could easily seek an additional source of income through taxation.
