Pennsylvania's December revenue more than anticipated

Pennsylvania collected more revenue in December — and in 2020, as a whole — than the state had originally anticipated, Revenue Secretary Dan Hassell reported Monday.

The state collected $3.7 billion in the General Fund in December, which was $465.8 million, or 14.5%, more than what was expected. Overall, $18.5 billion was collected during 2020, which was about $467.1 million, or 2.6% more than expected.

“Overall, revenue collections have been running ahead of estimates in recent months because of better-than-expected collections in our three primary revenue sources — sales tax, personal income tax and corporate net income tax,” said Jeffrey Johnson, a Department of Revenue spokesman.

Sales tax receipts totaled $1 billion in December, more than $54 million above the estimate, and the sales tax total for the whole year was $6.4 billion, 0.9% more than expected.

Personal income tax revenue was $36 million above the estimate for December and 0.5% above the estimate for the year, with the year-to-date collections falling at $7.4 billion. December corporate tax revenue was also high, at more than $771 million — nearly $309 million above the estimate.

Johnson said the corporate net income tax revenue accounts for the majority of the revenues over estimates.

“At this point, it’s difficult for the department to analyze what factors contributed to this,” he said.

Johnson said the state won’t receive corporate tax returns until late 2021. Those returns will provide more insight as to why the revenue ended up so high.

Some other revenue sources also came in above estimates in Pennsylvania, according to a news release, including inheritance tax revenue and realty transfer tax revenue.

“We’re pleased to see the national economy is showing signs of bouncing back from the recession caused by the covid-19 pandemic,” Johnson said. “However, we still have a long way to go to recover the revenue that was lost during the economic downturn last year.”