(The Center Square) — Pennsylvania’s annual budget has ballooned by nearly 64% under Gov. Josh Shapiro and his predecessor, both Democrats, an investigation by The Center Square found.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Keystone State\u2019s budgets\u00a0have\u00a0increased\u00a0three-and-a-half\u00a0times more\u00a0during\u00a0the last two\u00a0Democratic administrations than\u00a0the\u00a0previous\u00a0Republican one.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When\u00a0a Democrat\u00a0is\u00a0governor, state funding has\u00a0swelled\u00a06.3\u00a0% a year\u00a0on average.\u00a0When a Republican has been governor,\u00a0the\u00a0comparable\u00a0figure\u00a0has been\u00a01.8%.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Since Gov.\u00a0Tom Corbett, a Republican, left office in 2015, the state budget has spiked\u00a063.6%. His Democratic successors, Tom Wolf and Shapiro, have signed into law\u00a0budget increase to\u00a0$47.6 billion\u00a0last year from\u00a0$29 billion. If the legislature approves Shapiro’s request for $51.5 billion, funding will have swelled 14% in his three years in Harrisburg.<\/p>\n
The vast majority of the increases have gone toward the state’s budget for schools, prisons, and hospitals. Last year, Pennsylvania joined ten other states where the number of elderly (age 65 and older) exceeded children (age 17 and younger). The large percentage of old people caused the state to spend $16 billion to pay for Medicaid, the joint federal-state program for the disabled and elderly poor, in 2023, the last year for which figures are available.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Wolf and Shapiro presided over divided legislatures, with Republicans controlling the Senate during their administrations. And Wolf was governor during virtually all of the COVID-19 pandemic from February 2020 to May 2023, a three-year span when state funding swelled 29%.\u00a0But the Democratic governors managed to sign larger budgets into law\u00a0after proposing even larger increases.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Nathan Benefield, chief policy officer of the Commonwealth Foundation, a free market think tank, said Shapiro and Wolf, as well as Ed Rendell, a Democrat who was governor from 2005 to 2011, deserve blame for overspending.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“The situation would be worse if the legislature hadn\u2019t rejected those spending increases\u2014and rejected several proposed tax increases in that time,” he said in an interview with The Center Square. “And every time there was a significant budget impasse\u2014including this year\u2014was because the governor wanted to spend significant more than the legislature would go for.”<\/p>\n
As a result,\u00a0Pennsylvania, a state of 13.1 million people,\u00a0spends more than what it takes in. This structural deficit is projected to grow to\u00a0$4.8 billion\u00a0this year\u00a0\u2014 more than 10% of the\u00a0state\u2019s\u00a0$47.6\u00a0billion\u00a0budget\u00a0last year.\u00a0Structural deficits contribute to inflationary pressures on the cost of goods, force governments to spend money to defray the debt, and create unstable finances.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for Shapiro did not\u00a0respond to a request for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The expected shortfall has\u00a0been a sticking point in negotiations\u00a0between Democrats and Republicans\u00a0over the state\u2019s budget. Since the fiscal year began July 1, lawmakers have been at an impasse, a reflection of a divided legislature.\u00a0Republicans control the state Senate with a 28-to-22 majority, while Democrats\u00a0control the House with\u00a0a one-seat majority, 102 to 101.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Shapiro\u00a0has\u00a0criticized Republicans\u00a0as\u00a0showmen\u00a0rather than legislators.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“They\u00a0elect their senators to be part of a\u00a0full-time\u00a0Senate\u00a0to get paid full time, and then they worked\u00a032 days\u00a0over the last 246,” Shapiro said\u00a0on Oct. 8. “It’s time for the Senate to come back to work [and] be serious about passing a budget.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
State Senate President Tempore Kim Ward, a Republican,\u00a0has implied that Shapiro\u2019s criticism is hypocritical, alluding\u00a0to a\u00a0trip to Canada he took earlier this month\u00a0where he\u00a0sought\u00a0to boost trade with the nation and Great Lakes states<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has been unable to bring the parties together so instead he flies around the state on taxpayer dollars getting his face in front of the cameras and pointing fingers,\u201d Ward said on Oct.\u00a021. \u201cThat\u2019s\u00a0not how,\u00a0using\u00a0the governor\u2019s words, you \u2018get stuff done.\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Shapiro has proposed tapping into\u00a0$1.7 billion\u00a0of\u00a0the state\u2019s\u00a0emergency savings account, known as the\u00a0\u201cRainy Day Fund.<\/p>\n