January 11, 2021      8:40 PM

Hegar: Texas will end biennium with $1 billion shortfall; $112.53 billion will be available for 2022-23 biennium, a slight decrease from past session

In delivering the revenue estimate, Hegar said “The forecast, however, remains clouded with uncertainty. The ultimate path of the pandemic and the behavior of consumers and businesses during a resurgence are difficult to gauge. It’s also unclear how they’ll respond once the pandemic is fully under control."

Strong consumer spending has lifted the state budget’s projected deficit to just under $1 billion, with available general revenue now calculated at almost the same level as the state’s last budget: $112.5 billion.

Those numbers, announced by Comptroller Glenn Hegar this morning in his biennial revenue estimate, puts Texas in the minority of states that won’t be forced to make significant cuts due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Hegar predicts the economic recovery to be sooner, rather than later, in Texas. Tax collections won’t be the heady 11 percent growth lawmakers have seen in flush sessions, but they will be comfortably in the black as Texas moves through the next biennium.

Copyright January 11, 2021, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved