FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
February 26, 2014

Speaker Silver and Ways and Means Chair Farrell Release Assembly's Annual State Revenue and Economic Reports


Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Assembly Ways and Means Committee Chair Herman D. Farrell, Jr. today unveiled the Assembly Majority's annual Revenue and Economic Reports for New York State.

These reports are essential to the Assembly's work with Governor Andrew Cuomo and the Senate in the adoption of a state budget that is fiscally prudent and on-time.

The Assembly Revenue Report projects All Funds at $140.7 billion for SFY 2013-14, an increase of $7.5 billion from the previous year, and $82 million below the Executive's estimates.

For SFY 2014-15, the report forecasts All Funds at $142.3 billion, an increase of $1.6 billion from the previous year. The Assembly's estimates for All Funds receipts are $410 million higher than the Executive's forecast.

"The in-depth economic analysis found in these reports helps the Assembly prepare for a range of fiscal decisions that will impact the funding of such budget priorities as education, health care, job creation and boosting the economies of communities across the state," said Silver. "I commend Ways and Means Committee Chair Denny Farrell and his staff for compiling this economic data that is critical to the Assembly's efforts to provide the people of this state with a timely budget and a realistic spending plan as we have done for the last several years."

"Our data shows the state's economic gains continue to be slow and steady as we recover from the deepest recession since the Greatest Depression," said Farrell. "This requires us to remain cautious and to work within the fiscal realities of today's economy while still making investments in the people of this state."

The Assembly Economic Report forecasts a modest pace of growth for employment in the state for the next fiscal year. For base wages, the Assembly projects wages to continue to recover this year and the next, reflecting an expectation of a slow but continuing recovery.