State Revenues Report Opens Without A Bang

Sacramento, CA — California’s first month of the year revenue figures started off down by nearly nine percent from what was projected.

The report put out by State Controller Betty Yee showed that January’s total revenues of $18.79 billion were lower than estimated in the governor’s 2019-20 fiscal year budget proposal. The numbers were down by $1.81 billion or 8.8 percent.

The same was true for total revenues that reached $74.42 billion for the first seven months of FY 2018-19 in the proposed and enacted budgets, which were down by $2.87 billion and $1.32 billion, respectively. In the fiscal year to date, state revenues are just 0.2 percent lower than the same time last year.

There were some gains as two of the state’s “big three” revenue sources, sales and corporation taxes, came in higher than forecasted in last month’s enacted budget, with sales coming in at $647.4 million higher and a 12 percent jump for corporations. Total sales tax receipts were $1.59 billion and $579.2 million in corporation taxes.

Personal income tax (PIT) receipts, however, took a hit in January. They totaled $16.36 billion, which is a decrease of $2.53 billion or 13.4 percent than the Department of Finance had projected; although that is still $403.6 million or 2.5 percent higher than calculated in the enacted June budget. Additionally, the PIT revenue was still 4.8 percent higher than in January 2018.