Rapid growth of Oregon budget continues

by Dan Lucas

Last week the 2015-17 Budget Highlights Update (which includes 2016 “short session” actions) came out from the State of Oregon’s Legislative Fiscal Office.

Oregon General & Lottery Funds Budget

It’s an update to the current 2-year Oregon state budget – the 2015-17 Oregon budget passed in the 2015 Regular Session. As I noted last July, this General & Lottery Funds budget “reflects a staggering increase of $2.1 billion from the previous $16.8 billion budget.” That was on top of another staggering increase of around $2 billion from the previous budget cycle.

The General & Lottery Funds budget is the portion of the state budget that the Legislature has the most direct control over, and is what is generally discussed in the news when referring to the “Oregon state budget.”

Last week’s update contains charts that show the continual rapid growth of the Oregon budget. The charts show the General & Lottery Funds budget grew over $6.5 billion in just the past 10 years – from around $12.5 billion in 2005-07 to $19 billion now!

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In last week’s update, the current General & Lottery Funds budget is now $19.033 billion. That’s an increase of $134 million from when the current budget was first passed – $18.899 billion back last July.

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Oregon All Funds Budget

Charts in last week’s update also show continual staggering growth in Oregon’s All Funds budget. The All Funds budget has grown $30 billion in just the past 10 years – it is now $71 billion!

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To read more from Dan, visit www.dan-lucas.com