The general fund portion of the state budget proposed by Gov. Jerry Brown spends $5.05 per $100 of personal income earned statewide. That's the lowest amount since the 1972-73 budget year, when Ronald Reagan was governor and state spending per $100 of personal income was $5.01.
Programs have changed names and missions, and any comparison made across nearly 40 years can brush over differences. But some trends are clear. State spending has shrunk as a proportion of personal income over the past decade. Spending on higher education and cash assistance to families has dropped as a proportion of general fund spending. The state now invests much more in prisons and K-12 schools.
State spending reached a peak of $7.43 per $100 of personal income from 1978 to 1981, after voter-approved Proposition 13 cut off property tax revenue to local governments. The state responded by transferring billions of dollars to those governments to pay for education and other services.
More recently, spending hit another peak of $6.88 per $100 of income in 2000-01, at the tail end of the dot.com boom, when state coffers were flush.
In some cases, lower state spending doesn't necessarily mean fewer services on the ground. Public universities, for example, have boosted tuition to make up for lost state money. More federal money may also have replaced lost state funds for other programs.
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