PUBLICATIONS

2024

IFPI Interim Study Committee Wrap-Up    

General Assembly Issues Few Policy Proposals from Study Committee Work in 2024 - It is that time of year again – the Indiana General Assembly has shuttered the legislative interim work, in preparation for the 2025 biennial budget session. In years past, each of the interim study committees would have met multiple times and would have issued recommendations and draft legislation for consideration, in advance of the upcoming legislative term. Instead, this year many committees never met and if they did the committees only met once and issued no recommendations. Only a handful of interim study committees issued a final interim study committee report. This atypical occurrence on the part of interim study committees may be in part a result of giving deference to Governor-Elect Braun and his team as they roll out his policy agenda for the 2025 biennial budget session. Read more here. 

Fifty Years of Indiana Property Tax Policy    

Big Increases in Homeowner Tax Bills Lead to Innovations in Property Tax Policy - Dr. Larry DeBoer outlines fifty years of property tax policy innovation. The innovations have come in several broad categories. Property tax burdens are shifted to state sales or local income taxes. Limits are placed on local government levies or property tax bills. Deductions and credits are applied across the board or offered to owners of particular property categories. The kinds of property subject to taxation are narrowed, or the local government services that the tax supports are limited. A thorough history of these changes is found here.  

The COVID Pandemic and the Indiana Property Tax  

Indiana homeowners are still dealing with rising tax bills from increased property values that began in 2021 and 2022 - Dr. Larry DeBoer outlines the causes and effects of rising home values from COVID on Indiana's property tax system. Dr. DeBoer provides in-depth analysis to determine possible scenarios in for 2025. Read more here. 

See Dr. DeBoer's September 30, 2024 presentation for IFPI here. 

See all of the presentations from the September 30, 2024 property tax event here. 

Advancing Apprenticeships   

Expansion of Apprenticeships as a Talent Development Solution Raises Secondary Policy Concerns - Employer demand for workers continues to outpace Indiana’s supply of individuals looking for work. Like many other states, Indiana is looking to help solve this issue through creation of robust youth and adult apprenticeship programming. Apprenticeships are widely considered to be a gold standard of workforce programs, but scaling these programs to meet the needs of Indiana’s 21st century economy will be challenging. Research on adult and youth apprenticeship leads to several conclusions for Indiana policy makers. Read more here. 

2024 Fiscal Year Closeout Brief  

State Closes Out Year With $2.5 Billion in Reserves, Expenditure Increases - Indiana Comptroller Elise Nieshalla and state budget leaders released the close-out report for Fiscal Year 2024 (ending June 30, 2023) on July 23, 2024. As with last year, the increased consumer spending that spiked revenues in 2022 have returned to historical, moderate growth patterns. Also, federal funding is expected to continue reductions from Covid-era federal transfers to states. Indiana raised $21.9 billion in revenues in the fiscal year, which is a modest 1.49% growth over revenues for the fiscal year 2023. However, spending totaled $21.5 billion, a substantial increase of 19.4% over the previous year. Read more here. 

2024 Legislative Session Wrap-Up  

2024 Legislative Session - Short Session Ends With Focus on Workforce Development, Education. Fiscal Issues On Hold Until 2025  -The Indiana General Assembly adjourned the “short” session on the evening Friday, March 8, 2024. While the session was labeled as short, that does not mean it was uneventful. A total of 756 bills and resolutions were introduced. In the final analysis, only 172 were passed and sent to Governor Holcomb for his signature. That is still a fair amount of legislation to be passed in a short ten weeks. For his part, the Governor only vetoed one bill, an education bill containing anti-discrimination language. On the tax side, only minor tweaks to local income taxes and property taxes were passed, most making little discernable impact. Several local food and beverage and Innkeepers’ taxes were approved, as well as administrative bills from the Department of Local Government Finance and the State Board of Accounts. These bills will certainly impact local government finance officers, but will be little noticed outside of fiscal experts. Read more here. 

HEA 1002 (2023) - A New Hoosier Education Model

A Brief on the Opportunities and Challenges Around this New Uncharted Model for Education  -  In 2023, Indiana passed House Enrolled Act 1002. Legislators in support of the bill touted it as an opportunity to “reinvent high school” in Indiana by melding youth apprenticeships and work-based-learning opportunities with a school choice funding mechanism. As Indiana, like many states, continues to battle a growing labor shortage, building a talent pipeline in high school is a strategy that many states are embracing. This brief is the first of a series on Indiana’s emerging commitment to youth talent development and how it intersects with the growing school choice movement and interest in youth apprenticeship and work-based-learning in the Hoosier state. The brief touches on some of the barriers to the success of the program, and how those might be addressed in the years to come. Read more here. 

Pre-Legislative Session Fiscal Brief

Starting Session with a $1.5 Billion “Surprise”, Indiana Dips Below 10% Reserve for First Time Since Pandemic -  The Indiana General Assembly returns next week on January 8, 2024, for a “Short Session”. Historically short sessions do not include the development of a traditional state budget, but there are fiscal issues that arise. This year, there are a few complications, laid bare in last month’s revenue forecast presentation to the State Budget Committee, that fiscal leaders will be forced to discuss. These include an unexpected overspend of $1 billion in Medicaid spread over state Fiscal Years (FY) 23-25 and a revised revenue forecast that reduced anticipated revenue collection by $500 million – these two factors combined to drain quite a bit of Indiana’s state reserves. Read more here. 

2023

IFPI Interim Study Committee Wrap-Up

2023 Legislative Interim Study Committee Wrap-Up -  As the Indiana General Assembly prepares for a new 2024 legislative session, they are wrapping up the work that was done this Summer and Fall vis a vis interim study committees. Each year, these committees study a wide variety of topics, often making recommendations for legislation to be considered by the full General Assembly to take up when it is next back in session. This year was no exception, with several fiscal policy relevant committees meeting and weighing in on important public policy issues. Read more here. 

IFPI Hoosier Talent Snapshot

2023 Hoosier Talent Snapshot -  Indiana's consistently tight labor market continues to be one of the primary challenges for Hoosier policy makers. The IFPI 2023 Hoosier Talent Snapshot is a primer for those who need more information on the challenges to building a talent pipeline, as well as potential opportunities to overcome barriers to work. Read more here. 

IFPI FY Closeout Report

FY 2023 Close-Out Report - Back to Baseline - The State of Indiana closed the books on the fiscal year on June 30, 2023. On July 13th, fiscal leaders announced the state of Indiana’s balance sheet. Overall, increased consumer spending that spiked revenues in 2022 returned to baseline – Indiana raised $21.6 billion in revenues in the fiscal year, which is 0.7% over revenues for the previous year. Spending totaled $18 billion, an increase of 2.4% over the previous year. This normalization of revenues brings Indiana back within a typical (pre-Covid) range. The surplus of $2.9 billion is also more in line with historic averages. Read more here. 

IFPI Legislative Recap

Indiana's 2023 Legislative Session - A Brief Summary of a Session Long on Fiscal Impact - On April 28, 2023, Indiana passed a balanced $44.6 billion biennial budget that maintains healthy fiscal reserves, pays down pension debt, increases K-12 funding, and accelerates already planned decreases in the state's individual income tax rate. Other bills that impact Indiana's fiscal health also passed this Session. A high-level summary of the most pertinent legislation is outlined here.