Beckley Register-Herald – Gov. Jim Justice and state Revenue Director Dave Hardy would have you believe, by evidence of a press briefing this past Thursday where each gushed about buckets of cash on hand and revenue collection improvements year over year, that the West Virginia economy is resurgent and so filled with goodness that fish are jumping straight out of the lake into the campfire skillet. Read full article.
In an enlightening analysis – complete with helpful graphics – of just where the state stands with its revenues, and the sleight of hand Justice and Hardy attempted to pull off, Sean O’Leary, a senior policy analyst at the nonpartisan West Virginia Center on Budget & Policy, crunched the numbers and said, essentially, what most of us out here in the real world already know.
“… a closer look at the state’s revenue collections shows a weakening state economy that has been relying heavily on federal aid to stay afloat,” O’Leary wrote.
