House Budget Breakdown - A Decade in Review
From fiscal year 2014 to fiscal year 2023, there have been many differences between each budget in the Massachusetts House of Representatives. This is in part due to administrative and legislative changes, but also because of the changing needs of the Commonwealth over the past ten years. As debate concluded yesterday evening in the House on the amendments included in the 2023 appropriations act, our data from the last ten years reveals some interesting trends worth noting.
One highlight shown by our findings is that since 2014, the House budget itself has become more robust, despite the use of consolidated amendments. The annual appropriation increase by year has ranged between $1B and $2B, for a total of an $18.6B increase over the past ten years. While inflation and the establishment of more state-funded programs are largely attributable for this increase, there also has been a relative growth in the number of amendments filed each year. Displayed in the graphic above, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020, the number of amendments filed per year was steadily increasing, before beginning to plateau from 2018 to 2020. While COVID-19 was a likely factor in fewer amendments being filed in FY21 and FY22, as the state has recovered from the pandemic, the increase in overall budget amendments has once again continued. This year’s budget alone had the most amendments of the past decade, with 1,521 filed.
Similar trends also occurred when looking more closely at the amendment data, such as the number of earmarks and refiled amendments per fiscal year. Earmark amendments - which allow legislators to reserve amounts within line items for particular programs - are likely one reason for the increase in budget amendments over time. Again, with the exception of the break in FY21 and FY22, more earmarks have been adopted each year since 2014, reaching the decade’s peak in this year’s budget. The number of refiled amendments per year likewise experienced a dip as a result of COVID-19 but yielded a far smaller variation than that of earmark and general amendments.
Other facets of the House budget have shown a different shift over the past ten years though. Most notably, between Governors Deval Patrick and Charlie Baker, there was a significant change in the number of outside sections in the House budget. Outside sections are sections attached to the budget (not line-items) that typically create a new law or amend an existing one. Under the Patrick administration, the House had 167 more outside sections on average, which is perhaps possible due to partisan differences between the branches. However, a substantial amount of policy related amendments have been filed in the budget under Baker’s leadership, so it appears political differences hold only varied importance.
With the budget debate concluding yesterday, many still have questions about what amendments actually made it through to the final version. For this, and all other budget related information, MassTrac can help! We have full summaries available of all amendments from yesterday’s budget, and can provide a full analysis for any budget of the last decade. For more information or to see a demo of our services, please reach out to info@instatrac.com.