The Illinois legislature’s financial forecasters said Tuesday they expect the state to fall about $184 million short of the revenue needed to pay for this year’s state budget.

 

At the same time, the Commission on Government Forecasting and Accountability warned the state’s economy will likely see a slowdown in 2020 which could exacerbate the state’s financial problems.

 

“The consensus is to not have a recession in 2020, but the consensus is for a significant slowdown through the course of the forecast period,” said Jim Muschinske, COGFA’s revenue manager.

 

He said the state’s economy would still grow, but it would be at a slower rate.

 

The bi-partisan commission said it now believes the state will collect about $38.3 billion in revenue by the end of the fiscal year on June 30. However, the current state budget assumed the state would collect $38.5 billion.

 

State income tax collections are projected to end the year $450 million higher than expected and sales taxes are doing slightly better than expected. However, the state never sold the James R. Thompson Center which was projected to generate $300 million for state coffers, and the state didn’t borrow money from special state funds which was authorized in the budget.

 

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