South Carolinians will see a renewed major push for legalized online sports betting in January when the General Assembly reconvenes, despite two recent legislative failures and a pair of new studies that highlight gambling’s social costs.

The reasons, experts and policymakers say, are simple: money and momentum.

Since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the federal law prohibiting states from authorizing sports betting in 2017, 38 states have legalized the practice in some form. Last year, states generated more than $2.5 billion in taxes from $11 billion in industry revenue.

And now with North Carolina generating eye-popping revenues just across the border in its first five months of legal online sports gambling, experts like Stephen Shapiro of the University of South Carolina Department of Sport and Entertainment Management think S.C. legislators will feel significant pressure to act.

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