State Revenue Growth Higher than February Projections
In the first quarter of the Fiscal Year, income tax grew 11.3% which represented a $135 million dollar increase over the first quarter of last year. Nominally, state and local sales taxes each grew by similar amounts, at $80 million and $81 million, respectively, over the previous fiscal year. The special fuel tax (which includes diesel) continued to perform well, posting 15.1% year-over-year growth, and furnishing most of the growth to the Transportation Fund. Corporate Taxes are notably behind last year, with a 28.6% reduction representing a $44 million decline in revenues. In terms of percent change, Mining Severance Tax demonstrated the largest growth with a 37% increase, though this only represented a $1.2 million increase in collections over last year. As always, revenue growth rates are highly volatile during the first half of any given fiscal year and caution is advised when drawing conclusions based upon these figures.
Revenue to both the General and Education Funds totaled $2.4 billion through the first four months of the Fiscal Year 2020, representing a year-over-year growth rate of 5.5%. This growth is about 2% higher than the unadjusted consensus revenue target from February. The targets will be updated later this month when the Governor’s budget is released and will also incorporate year-end numbers from Fiscal Year 2019.
For the full November report: click here.
For the full Quarter 1 Revenue Summary report: click here.