On October 14, about 50,000 skill games across Pennsylvania went dark. Bars, clubs, fire halls and truck stops lost a revenue line many had counted on for years. The machines are gone, but the demand behind them is still there, and so is the money.
We believe, and many people close to the process expect, that Pennsylvania will pass a law regulating these machines in 2027. The open question is which law. The bills now in front of the legislature disagree on nearly everything that decides who makes money: the state's tax, how many machines a site can hold, which venues qualify, and how the rest is divided between the operator and the location.
Those differences are not small. The same five-machine bar could keep about $42,600 a year under one proposal and more than $126,000 under another.
Today we're releasing two tools so owners and operators can see that before the vote rather than after.
The PA VGT Revenue Projector
The PA VGT Revenue Projector puts every major proposal side by side: Governor Shapiro's 52% budget plan, SB 756 from Senate Republican leaders, Rep. Diamond's HB 2801, Sen. Yaw's 16% plan, and the $500-a-month flat fee in SB 1079 and HB 2213, with Illinois's law alongside for comparison.
Pick a bill, and the tax, machine limit and revenue split change with it. Then choose your side of the table:
Location owners set their machine count and expected play and see what they would keep each year after state tax, license fees and the operator's share, under the bill they picked and under every other one.
Operators and investors set the size of a route and get the capital needed to open it, a five-year profit and loss, cash payback, EBITDA per terminal and an implied value.
Every default is drawn from public sources and cited on the page. Where a bill is silent, most often on the operator–location split, the projector says so and marks the figure as an estimate.
What the numbers show
Run at the Independent Fiscal Office's regulated-case play level ($165 per machine per day), the ranking is clear:
Best for locations: SB 756, because seven machines per site beats a lower tax for a room that can fill them ($127,900 a year), then the $500 flat fee ($126,500), Yaw ($118,600) and Diamond ($112,800).
Best for operators: the $500 flat fee ($13.6 million in year-three EBITDA on a 150-location route), then SB 756 ($13.4 million), Yaw ($12.2 million) and Diamond ($11.4 million).
Last for both, and far last for locations: the governor's plan. It keeps the existing truck-stop split, so the operator's take looks like a 35% bill while the location's share falls to 15% and about $42,600 a year.
Two lessons stand out. First, the revenue split matters as much as the tax rate, and most bills have not written it down yet. Second, a flat per-machine fee rewards busy rooms and penalizes slow ones. Above about $108 per machine per day it beats even the lowest proposed tax. Below that, a percentage tax is the better deal.
The Pennsylvania Market Analysis, publishing today
The projector is built on the same model as our full report, Pennsylvania After the Skill Games, which publishes today.
The report weighs Pennsylvania against Illinois, the country's largest regulated video gaming market, across 32 public measures, including adult population, spending power, lottery and casino demand, and the number of bars, restaurants and clubs. On that basis, it sizes a regulated Pennsylvania market at about $3.5 billion a year in net win, or roughly $204 to $254 per machine per day depending on how many machines the law allows. It also covers:
Every bill side by side, including the details nobody has written down yet
Projected revenue under each proposal
An investor pro forma for a terminal operator: startup, capital, operating costs and payback
A pro forma for location owners: what a bar, club or truck stop keeps under each bill
The levers lawmakers can still pull, from bet limits and hours to venue rules
The report is free. Request your copy here and we will email it to you.
Why we built this
I spent 20 years in distributed gaming across Illinois and Pennsylvania. I watched Illinois grow from its first machines in 2012 into the largest video gaming market in the country, and the locations that did best were the ones that understood the economics before the first machine arrived. Pennsylvania's owners deserve the same head start.
If you run a bar, club or truck stop in Pennsylvania, or you're weighing an investment in the market, run your numbers, get the report, and talk to us.
— Chris Schink, President, Monte Cristo Gaming
Monte Cristo Gaming (QBFOX, LLC) is pursuing Illinois Gaming Board terminal operator licensing. It holds no Pennsylvania license, and none exists for this business today. The projector and report are independent analysis of public information, not legal, tax or investment advice. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER.
