Don’t take fiscal surplus forecasts too seriously
While we do not know yet the final outcome in the stock market, it is highly unlikely that the market will regain in one month the large losses it has sustained in the prior 11 months.
Don’t take fiscal surplus forecasts too seriously
Connecticut’s Office of Policy and Management (OPM) and its Office of Fiscal Analysis (OFA) both released fiscal accountability reports Nov. 18 forecasting annual fiscal surpluses through fiscal year 2026.
While these reports are legally mandated to be issued in November, they are exercises in virtual futility at this time of year, especially this year. Why? Because one of the largest sources of revenue and the largest category of expense involve significant unknowns even for the current fiscal year ending June 30, 2023.
Revenue from taxes on investment income (“Estimates & Finals” and “Passthrough Entity Tax”) is highly variable and unpredictable. Indeed, state law labels it officially as “volatile.”
State employee compensation expense, including wages, pensions and health care expenses is the largest category of expense. This year, pension and retiree health care expenses are largely unknowns after triple the normal number of employees retired last fiscal year; estimating retirement obligations is largely the responsibility of the state’s outside actuaries, who have not yet submitted their updated valuation reports.
The OPM and OFA reports would be much more valuable if issued in January, when the actuaries’ valuation reports are in hand and the stock market outcome is final, and investors have filed mid-January quarterly tax filings, including payments supposed to bring their cumulative quarterly payments up to their full-year obligation.
Last fiscal year, this revenue surged to $6.5 billion, overshooting the budget by 44 percent and reaching 26 percent of total revenue, on the strength of a soaring stock market. The S&P gained 25 percent and the technology heavy NASDAQ advanced 35 percent in 2021.
This fiscal year has seen a dramatic reversal of fortune. So far in 2022, the S&P is down 15 percent and the NASDAQ is down 27 percent. Yet we won’t know the final outcome until January.
So much for recommendations.
Now to the substance of the actual reports just released.
While we do not know yet the final outcome in the stock market, it is highly unlikely that the market will regain in one month the large losses it has sustained in the prior 11 months.
On average, there can be gains only if the stock market is up for the year. If the stock market were up but not as much as previously, that would imply smaller gains and lesser tax revenue from those reduced gains.
Yet, 2022 is producing big losses, not lesser gains. It is not unreasonable to predict at least a 50 percent decline in taxes on investment income, which will likely be comprised only of dividend and interest income and some real estate gains.
Yet, that is not the prediction in the OPM and OFA reports. Back last April when the fiscal 2023 budget was adopted, a decline of only 15 percent to $5.5 billion was budgeted. Why aren’t OPM and OFA revising the budget lower after seven months of market declines?
When I asked OPM this question back in late September, the OPM spokesman replied “the state is virtually on target with what we received in September last year.”
The problem with this explanation is that most of this type of revenue is realized in January through April and beyond. Indeed, OPM’s own report (page 17) says “Almost 40 percent of total collections are received in April when final tax returns are filed …”
Accordingly, being on target through September or mid-November is virtually meaningless.
The fiscal 2022 budget for this type of revenue was set at $4.5 billion in April 2021. Even as the stock market soared in the following months, OPM did not revise the budget, even as late as March 2022.
Only a full 12 months later on April 20, 2022, did OPM finally increase its estimate — by a whopping $900 million to $5.4 billion. Twelve days later it increased it another $800 million to $6.2 billion.
The same thing is happening this year, but in the other direction. This may be unchangeable risk-averse bureaucratic behavior. So, delaying the timing of the fiscal accountability reports may not help.
But wait. Maybe tax returns with all-important E&F and PET tax payments are not processed by Department of Revenue Services on a timely basis?
Monthly revenue figures by revenue category are tracked the State Comptroller’s Office. In fiscal 2022, the monthly tally in January did not show large numbers for E&F and PET tax receipts. Unless most taxpayers were delinquent and didn’t pay on time, the problem was slow processing. Indeed, there doesn’t seem to be much urgency about the monthly numbers. The comptroller hasn’t released any monthly numbers since last May.
The bottom line is that no one should take the projections in the OPM and OFA fiscal accountability reports too seriously. Almost certainly, their projections of tax revenue from investment income for the current fiscal year (2023) are way too high. If so, likely there will be a cascade effect, throwing off predictions for later years.