A steadily improving economy will buffer California’s budget from a drop in revenue expected when temporary tax hikes begin to expire in the coming years, the state’s nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office said Wednesday. . . The expiring tax increases “will not necessarily cause a sudden revenue drop off – a `fiscal cliff’ – for the annual state budget process,” Taylor said.
California’s general fund will take in $2 billion more in revenue through June than lawmakers expected when they approved the current budget plan, the Legislature’s nonpartisan fiscal analyst said Wednesday, yet all of the increase will be absorbed by the state’s voter-approved constitutional school-funding guarantee.
Those unfunded liabilities – in effect, long-term debts – will haunt state and local governments for decades as other forms of public spending are squeezed to cover the immense pension gap, even if those in charge are loath to admit it.
But UC officials say the system also needs the money to help rescue its pension fund – neglected for two decades and facing $7.2 billion in unfunded liabilities – and to cover the growing cost of retiree health benefits.
Tax revenue to California’s general fund is running more than $1 billion above estimates since the July 1 start of the fiscal year, the state said Monday, as Gov. Jerry Brown prepares for another round of budget talks next year.
All that has changed, according to a far-reaching package of data from the state controller. Taxpayers are now on the hook for billions of dollars more to cover the future retirements of public workers, with the bill widely varying depending on where they live.
California is among 21 states where tax revenue in the second quarter of 2014 surpassed (after adjusting for inflation) what it was before revenue collapsed during the recession, the Pew report found. California received $34.9 billion in tax revenue from April through June of this year, 5.5 percent higher than its pre-recession high of $31.3 billion in the third quarter of 2006. That is more than triple the U.S. average of 1.6 percent.
State audit has found that the cost of the state’s recycling program for beverage containers has exceeded its revenue by over $100 million in three of the last four fiscal years.
Most published research focuses on tax incentives at the state level, where the largest packages are typically awarded. A new nationwide survey by the International City/County Management Association (ICMA), though, provides a detailed portrait of how local governments use business incentives and employ accountability measures.
Following voter approval of a state rainy day fund, Standard and Poor’s raised California’s credit to an A+ stable rating on Wednesday, the state’s fourth upgrade by a credit ratings agency in the past two years. The rating was raised from A.
If the dollars flow in the intended areas, the newly approved water bond and rainy-day fund both have the power to improve California’s economy, local business leaders said Wednesday.
Chiang added public pension systems to his already large fiscal database. One chart reveals that their “unfunded liabilities” – the gap between assets and liabilities for current and future pensions – exploded from $6.3 billion in 2003 to $198.2 billion in 2013.
Building on the state’s efforts to streamline the permitting process and make it easier to business in the state, the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz) today launched a new web page to highlight the best practices of business groups and state and local permitting agencies that are making their programs more user friendly for businesses.
Local-government employers contributions to defined-benefit retirement systems have nearly tripled in the last 11 years, according to the most recent data published by the California State Controller’s Office, while employee contributions have nearly doubled.
Total revenues in September reached $9.8 billion and beat forecasts contained in the 2014-15 Budget Act by $671 million, or 7.4%. All of the “Big 3” revenue generators — personal income, corporate income, and retail sales taxes — surpassed expectations.