Texas Comptroller Susan Combs today officially certified the state’s surplus at $14.3 billion. The president of Texans for Fiscal Responsibility, Michael Quinn Sullivan, offered the following statement:
“The surplus is not found money, but rather the overpayment by Texans for the cost of government. The legislature should return the money back to the taxpayers in the form of tax relief. That relief can come in the form of further reductions in property taxes, reduced business taxes, or a reduction in the state’s sales tax. But spending the surplus should not be an option; such spending merely commits Texans to even higher spending in future years, and therefore tax increases. If we return this money to the productive economy, projected slowdowns could be avoided or minimized. Indeed, the threat of economic slowdowns makes the case even more strongly for not commiting taxpayers to growing government programs that they may not be able to afford in the future.”
