BeforeItsNews only exists through ads. We ask all patriots who appreciate the evil we expose and want to
help us savage the NWO with more Truth to disable your ad-blocker on our site only so we can grow and expose more evil! Funding
gives us more weapons! Thank you patriots! Oh and If you disable the Ad-blocker - on your deathbed you will receive total
consciousness. So you got that going for you...which is nice!
Texas On The Verge Of Collapse: Budget Gap 18 Billion
Friday, June 4, 2010 5:39
% of readers think this story is Fact. Add your two cents.
The state of Texas was already facing a grim financial situation for the next legislative session: A budget gap that could reach $18-billion. If you were looking for a silver lining, you’ll want to ignore latest business tax numbers.
RJ DeSilva with the State Comptroller’s Office says new figures show a ten percent decline from last year.
“September through May for fiscal 2009, we’d collected about $4-billion,” DeSilva said. “And for the same time for this fiscal year, it’s been about $3.6-billion.”
There are a lot of people who could say “I told you so” about this. One of them is Dick Lavine. He’s at a progressive think tank called the Center for Public Policy Priorities. Lavine has been harping for years about how the taxes created in 2006 to fund a property tax cut weren’t big enough to cover the difference.
“The problem was, even at the time, they knew that the change in the franchise tax plus the increase in the cigarette tax wasn’t going to cover the revenue lost by school districts,” Lavine said. “They had cash on hand at the time and they’ve been trying to plug the hole ever since.”
The comptroller’s office is trying to make up the shortfall in part by paying more visits to businesses. The associate deputy comptroller told the House Ways and Means Committee last week that all of the largest taxpayers will be subject to audits.
