FY 2010 state revenue shrank (a tiny bit less than expected)

Full year state tax data came out last week.  In the official press release, the key numbers are stated this way:

“Fiscal Year 10 receipts are at their lowest level in five years, reflecting $201 million less than FY09 receipts; $439 million less than FY08 receipts; $349 million less than FY07 receipts; and $151 million below FY06 receipts,” said Lassiter. “We have reduced the state’s budget seven times over the past two and half years and are now in the process of cutting again.” Final FY10 revenues were $27.2 million, or 0.3 percent, more than the official revised revenue estimate rendered in December 2009 by the Consensus Forecasting Group (CFG) and modified by 2010 legislation, which projected a 2.7 percent decline in revenues.

Putting that in my own words, we expected revenue to be this low, and it was, and times are still tough.  The tiny good news is that we were approximately able to predict the problems, rather than getting surprised yet again.