Maryland finished the 2021 fiscal year with a roughly $2.5 billion unassigned balance in its general fund thanks to federal stimulus funding and higher tax revenues than expected in 2020, according to a Wednesday release from Comptroller Peter V.R. Franchot (D).
That unassigned balance amounts to roughly 5% of the state’s $48 billion operating budget for the 2021 fiscal year, the comptroller’s office said. The general fund is up 11.3% compared with pre-pandemic fiscal year 2019. The fund balance was driven up by higher-than-expected revenue growth, which Franchot attributes to federal stimulus funding.
The state’s personal income tax collections grew by 7.3% during the 2020 tax year, according to the release, and wage growth led to more sales tax revenues than expected during the last six months of the 2021 fiscal year. The state’s corporate income tax was also higher than expected.
Click here to read the rest of the article written by Bennett Leckrone over at Maryland Matters
