Georgians shouldn’t count on a rebate check next year as the state announced Tuesday that tax collections took a a 16.5 percent dive in April.
According to a press release from Gov. Brian Kemp’s office, the State of Georgia’s net tax collections for April totaled $4.19 billion for a decrease of $829.5 million – or -16.5 percent – compared to April 2022, when net tax collections totaled $5.01 billion.
Year-to-date, net tax collections totaled $27.79 billion for an increase of $256.9 million, or 0.9 percent, compared to the previous fiscal year, when net tax revenues totaled $27.54 billion at the end of April 2022.
Individual income tax (IIT) collections decreased by roughly $1.02 billion, or -32.4 percent, for a total of $2.14 billion compared to last year when income tax collections totaled $3.16 billion.
According to the press release, the sharp year-over-year decline in IIT revenues is due in large part to the first-year implementation of HB 149, passed in 2021, that permits certain pass-through entities such as S-Corporation and partnerships to make entity-level tax elections on behalf of their individual partners, beginning with tax year 2022 returns filed in 2023.
An S-Corporation is a tax filing where companies, partnerships or LLCs elect to pass corporate income, losses, deductions, and credits through to their shareholders for federal tax purposes.
The decrease in tax collections is a reversal of fortune for the state, which touted a record revenue surplus of $6.6 billion, which led to the income tax rebate checks hitting bank accounts and mailboxes this month.
