Background:

The economic downturn and multibillion dollar state budget deficit greatly impacted the approach legislators took in crafting the state budget bill.  The challenge was finding a sensible way to prioritize state tax revenue that would maintain essential state services and put the state on solid fiscal ground.  The non-partisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau gauges overall spending of a two year budget plan by looking at state spending in the previous year and doubling it, also called “base year doubled”.  For this budget, the base year doubled is $58,558,794,400. 

Outcome:
The overall budget grew to around $62 billion.  That represents an overall increase of just less than seven percent.

Many people have contacted me to express concern that state spending is far outpacing their personal incomes.  In response to a poll question on my website, 78% of people said state government should place a revenue cap on itself, just like the state caps the revenue that a public school district, villages and city can raise.