States allowing gambling with loose restrictions against addiction, no set mandatory limits, and low taxes have led to failing grades across New England.
A person monitors online sports betting during a game.
Dave Sanders/The New York Times
A first-of-its-kind report card on online gambling protections gave Massachusetts a D, with researchers giving all of New England a failing grade.
The Center for Addiction Science, Policy, and Research, a Rhode Island-based research organization, announced the rankings on Wednesday, giving a clear picture of how legalization of online sports and casino gaming has affected public health.
For more than a decade, researchers have known that gambling is an addictive substance, “just like heroin, opioids, tobacco, alcohol, and cocaine,” said Harry Levant, director of gambling policy with the Public Health Advocacy Institute at Northeastern University to Boston.com on Wednesday.
Levant said the rankings advise elected leaders that there is a serious public health crisis.
“Massachusetts got out over its skis; it adopted all without appropriate regulation,” he said. “And now it’s time to do something about that.”
Where Massachusetts stands
Legal sports betting is available in 38 states. In 2024, the U.S. industry reported $13.68 billion in revenue on nearly $150 billion in total wagers.
Massachusetts began allowing sports betting in March 2023. As of September 2025, Massachusetts has collected about $339.15 million in taxes.
The state earned some points in the rankings for a credit card ban on game funding, a problem gambling hotline, and funding for problem gambling messaging.
However, the low grade stems from the lack of mandatory loss limits, the allowance of in-game live betting, and the lack of a requirement for operators to stop offering bets to users exhibiting high-risk patterns. The state also does not require spousal consent for joint accounts, does not allow players to set limits, and allows for advertising.
“What the gambling industry and its sports partners have done is they have normalized an addictive product,” said Levant.
Researchers found that users place bets 90% of the time on mobile phones, and more than half are placed live during games in progress, a format researchers found linked to compulsive behavior.
In addition, the researchers found that more than half of sports betting revenue comes from problem gamblers. A Connecticut study found that 51% of sports betting revenue comes from roughly 2% of the population, or those with a severe gambling addiction.
“It is inherently dangerous because there are no guardrails,” Levant said. “It is available 20 hours a day, and it’s designed to keep people in constant action.”
Massachusetts has two bills in the works that would make online casino gambling legal in the state, with supporters saying it would help curb illegal gambling and raise tax revenues.
On the other hand, a bill called the “My Better Health Act,” proposed by Massachusetts State Sen. John Keenan, would impose restrictions on the state’s sports betting to help curb addiction.
Key measures include banning in-play and proposition bets, prohibiting ads during games, increasing taxes from 20% to 51% and requiring affordability check-ins for high-volume users.
If passed, Levant said, it “would make Massachusetts a recognized leader in the country at bringing public health regulation to the online sports gambling industry.”
How the rankings work
The CASPR scoring system evaluates each state on three dimensions: the extent of permitted online gambling, the protections in place, and the industry’s taxation.
The states that legalized both online sports betting and iCasino scored the worst, with Delaware, West Virginia, Michigan, and Rhode Island all at the bottom.
The report found that no state requires mandatory loss limits. The intervention, researchers say, is the most supported by evidence. Instead, states that legalized online gambling relies on industry-designed “responsible gaming” tools that users must opt into and can override.
Tax rates also ranged from 6.75% to 51%, with many states charging far lower rates than for alcohol or tobacco. Massachusetts taxes online gaming at 20%.
The highest-scoring states are those that have not legalized online gambling.
“CASPR’s new report card highlights both how far states will have to go on this issue and, just as importantly, provides some important, potentially bipartisan proposals for where they should be headed,” said Charles Lehman, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute, in a statement.
How New England states ranked
Massachusetts: 62/100, D
Maine: 51/100, D
Vermont: 51/100, D
New Hampshire: 41/100, F
Connecticut: 17/100, F-
Rhode Island: 11/100, F-
Beth Treffeisen is a general assignment reporter for Boston.com, focusing on local news, crime, and business in the New England region.
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