A new gambling tax has been proposed in the Asamblea Nacional. Not only would this measure tax the electronic gambling outlets here, but it also would levy a 1 percent tax on those using the gambling services.

A license fee schedule also is proposed, based on the number of people working at the gambling establishments.

The proposal also suggests that the government set up a center of electronic betting in Heredia to take advantage of the communications facilities put there by Intel Corp.

Electronic betting establishments are now working under a temporary tax plan. This proposal would be permanent.

The Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Comercio would have the responsibility  of keeping a registry of electronic gambling establishments. The ministry also would collect the taxes and issue the licenses, under terms of the legislative proposal.

The measure was put forward by Deputy Federico Vargas Ulloa.

The proposal would levy a tax of about $1,000 a year on each employee. Firms with 20 or less persons would pay a little more. Their license would be $25,000. The tax would top out with firms employing 61 or more persons. They would pay $60,000 a year.

Vargas suggests the one penny per dollar tax on electronic betting income. He estimated that the country would get about $1 million a year from the tax, and he suggested that the betting operators would not mind because the money would be paid by the bettors. The gambling operators would simply collect the money, he said.

The legislative measure leaves out a lot of issues that have been a concern to officials. For one, the bill does not provide for any character checks on operators of electronic gambling parlors. Security officials have been concerned by the infiltration of the Sicilian Mafia and other types of organized crime into the 

wide-open world of Costa Rican electronic gambling.

Electronic gambling covers several types of activities. The most common are the sportsbooks where employees take bets via computers and telephones from all over the world. However, more recently electronic casinos have appeared. These may be low-budget setups operating from a motel room near the airport via the Internet. Actual gambling takes place, and bettors elsewhere can see the action and make gambling decisions via the Internet.

The Internet casinos have been criticized because some operators do not pay winnings. Or they cheat. A.M. Costa Rica gets about one complaint a week from betters, mostly from the United States, who have been stiffed by gambling operations said to be located here. Costa Rica may have more than 150 such online casinos, and many of the gambling operations offer all forms from sportsbooks to online casinos.

Right now all an Internet casino needs is a Web hookup, a backdrop that looks like a casino and one or two persons to deal cards or use other gambling equipment.

Other operations use software that simulate slot machines or other types of gambling. These could be located anywhere.

Sportsbooks here employ many bilingual Costa Ricans and native English speakers.

Another problem that may defeat the aim of this newest piece of legislation is the fact that much money wagered through Costa Rican sportsbooks never reaches here and so is beyond the grasp of national taxes. Gamblers frequently maintain accounts at offshore banks far from Costa Rica. Their bets here are merely credits or debits of those offshore accounts.

The Vargas bill is among the first to hit the hopper. More are likely as lawmakers craft permanent fiscal reform measures to take the place of the one-year temporary measures passed last year.