Capital Comments

Indiana's fiscal new year began on July 1, and there are reasons to celebrate. Listen to Dr. Larry Deboer explain why. 

We’ve got an inflation problem. What should we do about it? That depends on what kind of inflation problem we’ve got. In May the consumer price index was 4.9% higher than it was 12 months before. The last time we saw an inflation rate that high was July 2008. The last time it was that high, and it was more than just rising gasoline prices, was October 1990. It’s the highest inflation rate in almos...

Might things be looking up? Dr. Larry Deboer takes a closer look at Indiana state revenue forecasts. 

What will happen with all the pent up demand for goods and services once the pandemic has passed? Dr. Larry Deboer has some thoughts...and a history lesson. 

Tax season is coming up. Federal income taxes are due on April 15, back to the normal date after last year’s delay. That’s the due date for Indiana’s state and local income taxes, too. The first installment of the property tax is due on May 10. You pay your motor vehicle excise tax with your vehicle registration each year. The due dates are based alphabetically; my last name gives me an April 7 du...

If you want to be remembered in economics, get yourself a curve. There’s the Lorenz curve, the Laffer curve, the Kuznets curve, and, probably most famous, the Phillips curve. Phillips was A.W. Phillips, an economist from New Zealand who worked in London. In 1958 he drew a curve connecting the dots between inflation and unemployment. When unemployment went down, inflation went up. The Phillips Curv...

The December state revenue forecast for Indiana projected that individual income tax revenue would be about $6 billion this year. But Indiana uses local income taxes too, and we know that the income tax revenues that local governments receive in 2021 will be just over $3 billion.

Can it be, is it possible, that 2021 won’t be terrible? The state revenue forecast was released on December 16 to provide a starting point for the Indiana General Assembly to craft a new state budget. Might the coming biennium be OK? It didn’t look OK last June. State revenues suffered an extraordinary drop in the last quarter of fiscal 2020, down $1.4 billion, 27 percent less than expected. We co...

How does the Great Recession of 2007-2008 compare to the COVID Recession of 2020? Larry Deboer, ag economist at Purdue University, explains. 

Though some predictions are harder than others, we are confident about this one: Property tax bills for farmland owners will go down next year. We can predict this because we know the base rate for farmland for tax bills in 2021. The base rate is the starting point for the assessment of farmland. The state’s Department of Local Government Finance applied its formula to six years of data on corn an...

Forecasts? Don’t talk about forecasts. You kidding me? I just want to know what’s happening now! With apologies to Jim Mora, that’s our problem. What’s happening in our economy, right now?

Believe it or not, these three things get tied together as Purdue Extension specialist, Larry Deboer, explains. Spoiler alert, the pandemic is part of the story. 

We got trouble, my friends, "with a capital T." The Indiana state budget closeout for fiscal 2020 was held in mid-July, so we have a good idea of how bad things are. Now that we know the numbers, we can take a look ahead. Let’s do some “supposing” about what could happen during this fiscal year 2021, and during the next biennium.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.

Timely topics on public policy issues related to state and local government in Indiana.