Census Bureau Reports Collapse In State Tax Revenue, Liquor Stores Only Bright Spot
Hopefully the administration by now has realized that unless it wants uprisings (either metaphoric or literal ones) it has to tackle the state situation. As today's Census Bureau update points out, and corroborates our earlier findings on the withoolding tax plunge, usually used to fill both State and Federal coffers, total state revenues dropped by 16% to $1.678 trillion, even as total expenses increased by 6.2% to $1.736 trillion.
Here are the highlights from the Census Bureau itself:
State governments took in nearly $1.7 trillion in total revenues in fiscal year 2008, a 15.8 percent decrease from 2007, according to new data on state government finances released by the U.S. Census Bureau. The largest share of those revenues came from taxes ($780.7 billion), which made up 46.5 percent. The decline was primarily because of a decrease in insurance trust revenue, which fell by $377.7 billion (72.7 percent).
Insurance trust systems are comprised of public employee retirement systems, the unemployment compensation system, state government workers’ compensation programs and other state social insurance trusts.
Total state government expenditures increased 6.2 percent from fiscal year 2007, totaling slightly more than $1.7 trillion in 2008. Education ($546.8 billion), public welfare ($412.1 billion) and highways ($107.2 billion) represented the top three outlays, accounting for nearly two-thirds of all state government total expenditures.
The findings come from the 2008 Annual Survey of State Government Finances, which includes data on revenues, expenditures, debt, and cash and security holdings for each state, as well as a national level summary. The major source of these finance statistics is the governments’ own accounting systems, either directly from a government’s own records or through intermediate reporting systems.
Eleven states spent more than 25 percent of total expenditures on public welfare, with Tennessee (32.8 percent), Maine (30.5 percent) and Rhode Island (29.8 percent) spending the highest percentage of their total expenditures. (See table) (Excel).
Public welfare spending is used to support people based on need and includes such items as old-age assistance, temporary assistance for needy families, and commodities and services provided under welfare programs, including medical care or burial services.
Hawaii (11.5 percent), Alabama (10.1 percent) and South Carolina (9.9 percent) led in spending on public health and hospitals as a percentage of total expenditures.
In addition to state taxes, state lotteries were another way many state governments (including Washington, D.C.) raised revenue in 2008. Total state lottery ticket sales reached $77.3 billion in 2008, an increase of 1.8 percent from 2007. Lottery prize payouts represented $56.7 billion in expenditures, a 1.4 percent increase over the previous year. And lottery proceeds represented $18.2 billion in state government revenue, an increase of 2.9 percent. New York ($2.7 billion), Florida ($1.4 billion) and California ($1.2 billion) led the nation in lottery proceeds.
The one bright spot: Liquor store revenues. Too bad there is no way for Obama to spin this off in a (Goldman underwritten) IPO.
(4 votes)
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on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:13
#158043
So, it looks like 2008 was right about where the 2001 number came out - just before the bottom in 2002.
Anyone want to bet that 2009 - net of borrowed federal money being poured into state coffers through "stimulus" spending - will be worse than 2002?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:18
#158054
What do you expect when you have small towns in Westchester County NY paying police officers $145,000 per year to write traffic tickets? Government spending gone bizarro.
http://www.lohud.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009911290371
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:02
#158186
Are you shitting me? That is revolting. And it is happening everywhere. The speeding ticket nonsense is a microcosm of everything that is wrong with local, county, and state governments. And all the multi-million dollar firehouses--all graft.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:49
#158241
Here in Chicago they steadfastly refuse to deal with this elephant in the room. Instead of restructuring downward the entire complex of municipal compensation and benefits across the board to some semblance of a sustainable condition, they instead are selling assets to mainatin the staus quo. Most recently it was the parking meters for a billion and a half...and revenue from that sale is already gone! They pay trash collectors 60-100k a year here, plus lifetime deluxe bennies! And, refuse to put the jobs up for competeive bid! I know unemployed people who would do it for half.
Municipal overcompensation will grind this country to a standstill.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 17:57
#158363
Nobody votes in the muni elections but the muni employess. Life being the bitch it is, trurns out that pols want to be re-elected.
So, they are logically taking care of their constituents.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 20:38
#158487
I agree, the pensions have to be cut and no retirement now until age 65 and if that does not work cut the salary.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:17
#158056
How can you run a successful business without malt liquor? :)
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 16:06
#158254
I don't know. Please tell me.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 18:22
#158381
Night Train makes for a suitable alternative if you're in a pinch.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:19
#158062
Imagine the revenue they could bring in if they legalized weed?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 14:18
#158144
WERD UP!
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:22
#158066
http://scdah.sc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/A44A92A5-F90E-4187-951E-064C738383BB/0/...
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:25
#158070
So we're twice as loaded now as we were in 1997?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:53
#158117
price of Old E has more than doubled since then.
And the states increased sales taxes since then.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:31
#158079
I'll drink to that, and raise you CW!
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:40
#158094
Gambling and drinking...What about guns and ammo?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:42
#158099
I'm telling you people, we gots to legalize da cannabis. Jobs, taxes-- What's not to love?
First commercial:
The scene starts in a gritty sepia and off white, as if you were looking at old pictures from the late 20s, early 30s. Bush, Schwarzenegger, Clinton, and Obama are in a room, passing a joint. Arnie takes the first big toke and holds it in his enormous lungs as he passes it off to Bush. Snippy, Bush says, "Don't bogart." Bush takes a hit and starts to choke on it. Everyone laughs, as Bush's eyes water, but he laughs too. After he recovers, he grabs a bag of Dorritos from Arnie (the only thing in the room in color) and passes the joint to Clinton. Clinton takes it and says, "I always inhaled," and takes a long, smooth drag off it, while the others chuckle, smile or knowingly go "ummmmhummm." Bush high fives Clinton, Arnie does a knuckle bump, grinning. Obama looks like a happy kid, watching as the joint makes the rounds to him. He quietly tokes and hands it off to Arnie who is just now finally exhaling his toke. Obama looks at them all as he exhales and says, "You realize this is how we will save the ecomony."
Throughout the clip, we see color gradually return to the picture, and the men looking very masculine. Arnie has buffed up for the part (it is highly publicized that he saw this as his duty to the nation to get in shape for the role) and the camera exploits this, lingering on his body. They laugh, tell jokes, and then we zoom in on the label on the pack: US Green Shoots.
We pan to pictures of vast fields, then harvesting, then factories, then loading and distribution. We pan to a shot of Green Shoots stock, leading the Dow. We pan to jails emptying, to hospitals with pleasant "smoking rooms" with animated patients enjoying blunts. We pan to happy couples sitting around at the end of the night, sharing one.
We end the commercial with the slogan and Obama's voice:
Green Shoots: Real change we can believe in.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:47
#158107
I have a dream...
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:54
#158120
Twisted and Beautiful. Thumbs up from this reviewer.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:56
#158123
priceless MsC priceless
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 14:34
#158161
We pan to a future where weed, now inextricably linked into government spending budgets and political grandstanding, becomes the drug of choice for every stupid yuppie on the block but because of regulation has been watered down to the point of being as useless to smoke as cigarettes, where the buzz lasts for five minutes and then devolves into a vague headache, and all that with an additional 50% excise tax where before there was none.
No thanks.
I am Chumbawamba.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 14:57
#158179
I dunno Chumba,
Like booze, you have rockgut which is cheap and abrasive, mid-grade stuff which is fine and various prices, and the good shit, which takes some bankroll.
Perhaps it would reflect how it is now sort of. You have sensi-bud, which is highly resinated and good:
http://tomdiaz.files.wordpress.com/2009/11/9784.jpg
Fantasy grade:
http://www.openjesus.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/marijuana2.jpg
all the way to home grown:
http://forum.grasscity.com/photopost/data/500/14242weed_bikini.jpg
Differing locations where it is grown, different techniques, all in all, I don't see why the gov would just fuck it up. They'd fuck some of it up, but not all.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:09
#158194
Two words: taxes and regulations.
What else do you need to know, my dear MsCreant?
I am Chumbawamba.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:24
#158214
Chumb, those sure beat fines and prison don't they? Remember, the smart leader finds a way to avoid war.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 20:58
#158500
Now, what do you think the real reason is for sending more enforcers to Afganistan? Empires have been built on addictions, from sugar to caffeine to opium. Leaders build empires from greed, ego and hubris, not because they are smart.
on Thu, 12/10/2009 - 11:46
#159036
Mary Jane is the #1 cash crop in the United States. Page 4:
http://www.drugscience.org/Archive/bcr2/MJCropReport_2006.pdf
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:29
#158221
I'll take door #3
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 18:45
#158397
Or you could just grow it yourself and let the idiots smoke dirtweed. I don't imbibe myself, but I have a big backyard and I plan on finding some dirty ne'er-do-well hippies to sell it to once the gubmint gets desperate enough for revenue to legalize it.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 14:53
#158168
Only in America will the government tell me it is safer for me to take 90mg of morphine each day as a chronic pain management patient than 30mg-50mg of morphine and 1-2grams of marijuana. I challenge anyone in government to explain how that makes sense.
Besides, this might actually provide a means for me to be able to return to some small sense of employability. That being the job of grading marijuana for the USDA and the CME.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:00
#158185
You go baby! Preach it brother man!!
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:08
#158187
With the amplitude and range of Layne who I might add died as a result of an opiate addiction. How many death certificates have been issued in the United States that list the cause of death as marijuana toxicity or overdose?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 21:45
#158542
Layne Staley? Yes, my old hero. The one who I used to listen to as we rode around and shot heroin and cocaine until the break of dawn.
Nowadays I just turn on the TeeVee whenever I need to feel all right.
on Thu, 12/10/2009 - 11:36
#159019
Too bad you found both of those art forms worthy of escapism. I would hope that the day will arrive when you find art worthy in and of itself regardless.
Peace
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:03
#158188
and, the chronic pain is as a result of your service to said government, is it not?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:13
#158198
Indeed it is. And not a day goes by where I do not look for every available means whereby I might be able to contribute to the economic activity of my community, besides as a consumer of products.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:10
#158197
This ain't no Kool Filter King I'm hittin'.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:04
#158190
Yes it is!!! +1000
It would be fun to see, if the legalization got some wind, who would be lobbying to stop it. Drug companies?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:34
#158228
Let's not forget industrial hemp...makes great rope for...many purposes...grows anywhere, needs little fertalizer and light on water needs. Makes clothing, bio-fuel, etc.
on Thu, 12/10/2009 - 00:15
#158657
Love it !
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:43
#158101
Send lawyers guns and money!!!
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:45
#158105
I'm curious about church offering collections, and whether they correlate with liquor store revenues.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 13:55
#158121
Sweet Jesus! I think you're one toke over the line!
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 14:34
#158160
Riding the storm out. Waiting for the fallout.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:00
#158184
I can just image that the Feds would be dumb enough to get a "capitalist" streak into them concerning the States-- and not provide much of a safety net.
I find it very ironic that the bailout efforts have been prioritzed at our financial system-- yet, California is still writing IOU's. Not that they deserve the predicament they're in...
Little wonder Texas wants to secede.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 15:46
#158239
I'm more of a legalize Hemp to drive/cause Cotton competition myself.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 16:08
#158256
That liquor store revenue can be easily adjusted for inflation since it left the jose cuervo gold standard.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 16:08
#158258
Got to love liquor stores as a revenue cash cow!
Up here in "socialist" Ontario, the liquor stores are government run and provide a steady cash flow for the budget. Interestingly the stores are often well designed and well situated on main streets adding a pleasant and stable anchor and source of traffic to small town downtown.
Even the Conservatives when they were in power could not make a business case to spin off the LCBO.
Sometimes government run business actually works!
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 17:31
#158340
The question to ask is not whether a business can be run well by a government, but whether a government has any business running it in the first place.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 17:50
#158354
If it is run well and the profits are used for the common good instead of fattening of investors, why should that be a problem?
Because it is go-vermin?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 18:17
#158377
Applying that rationale puts no boundaries on what businesses a government should and should not run. Perhaps only those it cannot run well? Maybe only businesses where competitors have been legislated out of existence?
Given that a government can make the rules for businesses it must compete against, how could it ever not run a business 'better'?
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 18:57
#158402
Investors would likely turn those profits back into the economy, creating more wealth and ultimately employing more people than a government-run program ever could. All out of "greedy" self-interest.
"Fattening investors"...please give it a rest. Rich people don't sit on piles of gold coins like Scrooge McDuck, they put their money to work, own businesses and hire people.
As for the "common good", it rarely is. Just think about where Medicare and Social Security are headed if you have any doubt. Greed, however, is what drives economies.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 21:14
#158517
Not enough for me to give a rats ass!
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 17:04
#158302
I'm doing my part!!
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 17:54
#158360
"The one bright spot: Liquor store revenues. Too bad there is no way for Obama to spin this off in a (Goldman underwritten) IPO."
I think the governor-elect in Virginia ran on the idea of basically spinning off the liquor stores. Sounds like a win-win to me, since state run liquor stores are so boring and sterile.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 18:08
#158368
Looking at the state income/expenses chart, one thing which jumped out at me was that you can draw an almost straight line through the tops of the expenses. This means that the expenses haven't done anything special, just linearly increased year by year. It doesn't appear to track the income and hasn't has a large recent increase.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 18:15
#158375
State controlled liquor distribution is a winner for the boyz , but a backdoor sin tax on the consumer.
Probably the ONLY enterprise California hasn't fukked up is booze distribution to the masses. You can buy all varieties in any supermarket or drug store. There's so much competition, pricing is way consumer friendly compared to controlled States....especially Sonoma wines.
I visit other States with gubmint-controlled liquor distribution and it's shocking how badly people get gouged.
Cali liquor stores are more expensive but their little pony bottle offerings are more affordable for the truly po thirsty folks who can only rustle up a few bucks at a time.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 18:40
#158391
It really is jarring to travel outside of the People's Republic of California and not see booze in supermarkets, or any kind of blue laws.
Sonoma wines though? Meh. Paso Robles is the place to go. There's some fantastic 2006 reds that have come out of there.
Personally, I'm doing my part to keep the booze industry going out here. Been drinking more wine this year than I ever have, and the wife and I are starting our brand new Christmas tradition...the booze exchange. I'm expecting a nice cognac or other brandy while the wife has requested an Amaretto.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 18:48
#158398
Welcome to Russia.
on Wed, 12/09/2009 - 21:57
#158559
Property taxes are the biggest threat to my small business. The town is a much bigger threat than the State or Feds. Property taxes is rent. One doesn't pay rent on something that they own, do they?
on Thu, 12/10/2009 - 08:15
#158790
bottoms up...........
on Thu, 12/10/2009 - 09:48
#158876
Let's add taxes from rope supplies and divorce attorney's. My girlfriends firm is going gangbusters