Pennsylvania has a number of tax subsidy programs that boost favored industries with public funding.
The state’s largest program, however, attracts less attention than many smaller programs. And it isn’t a fund for economic development, or emerging tech, or health care.
Rather, it’s an industry that saw its heyday in the 19th and 20th centuries: horse racing.
In fact, Pennsylvania taxpayers send more – significantly more – to horse racing in one year than the federal government will give the state in five years to build electric vehicle charging stations. Horse racing receives almost twice as much as Tennessee’s airports want from the southern state’s Legislature.
