Various pages of the US IRS tax return forms. Photo by Phillip Rubino/Getty Images
Welcome to The Topline, a weekly roundup of the big numbers driving the Minnesota news cycle, as well as the smaller ones that you might have missed. This week: state tax revenues come in well above expectations; excessive heat at work; the United States in hundreds of charts; this year’s pet parasite forecast; and an uncommonly moist start to summer.
General fund revenues keep coming in higher than estimates
The latest update on tax receipts from Minnesota Management and Budget shows that, once again, revenue is coming in well above expectations. May’s haul was a whopping 16.7% higher than forecast, carrying fiscal year-to-date receipts 2.1% above official projections.
Back in February, lobbyist Brian Rice explained why this keeps happening. It has to do, in part, with an overly negative view of the U.S. economy in the national forecasts Minnesota uses to create its own budget outlook. Rice argued then that DFL legislators were being too meek about new spending in the 2024 session. So far, the numbers keep proving him right.
How global warming affects workers’ compensation claims
A new report from the Workers Compensation Research Institute, a non-profit that studies employment policy, finds that on-the-job injuries increase as the temperature rises.
At 90 degrees, workers are about 5% more likely to injure themselves than they are when it’s between 65 and 70. The effect is strongest for construction workers, those in the South, and for traumatic injuries like broken bones.
Construction workers, for instance, are 20% more likely to get hurt on the job when it’s 95 degrees. Clerical workers, who mostly work in climate-controlled offices, are actually slightly less likely to suffer injuries at that temperature.
As global warming ratchets temperatures up higher, those heat-driven injuries are likely to become more common, unless businesses take steps to keep their employees safe. Unfortunately, in many southern states the opposite seems to be happening.
Florida, for instance, recently banned counties from mandating heat and water breaks for outdoor workers. Texas is trying to do something similar, although the effort has so far been thwarted by the courts.
110 pages of charts about America
USAFacts, a nonprofit that makes government data more accessible and easier to use, recently delivered a massive report to Congress charting a bunch of basic facts and figures about the country we all live in.
It’s a laudable effort, given how much of the national political discourse is unmoored from reality. A few highlights:
The massive visualization of federal revenue and spending on page 10, which would make a great wall-sized poster for the nerdiest person in your life.
The national map of food insecurity on page 52, showing Minnesota having some of the lowest rates of hunger in the U.S.
And the breakdown of the nation’s wealth on page 56, showing that the richest 1% own almost one-quarter of the country while the poorest 20% have just 3% of it.
And finally one so good that I’m including it here: long-term crime trends, showing that despite what so many conservative politicians would have you believe, most crime remains near historic lows.
The pet parasite forecast
It’s going to be a great summer for tick-borne illness, according to the latest parasite forecasts from the Companion Animal Parasite Council, a veterinary industry group.
Minnesota is a hotspot for Lyme disease and anaplasmosis, two tick-driven infections. The group expects more than 10% of dogs tested for the ailments will be positive in the northern two-thirds of the state. There’s also some risk for ehrlichiosis, yet another tick-borne disease, in parts of the north woods.
On the other hand, heartworm is relatively rare up here, so at least we’ve got that going for us.
Extremely wet and incredibly moist
You’ve probably heard by now that Minnesota is drought-free for the first time in several years, but what’s gotten less attention is just how waterlogged we are.
The map above, from the National Integrated Drought Information System, shows that in most of the state the soil moisture content is at or near record levels for the period of modern record keeping.
There’s so much water in the soil that new rain has no place to go, and as a result we get the catastrophic flooding that’s happening in parts of the state.
The post The Topline: State revenues continue to defy expectations appeared first on Minnesota Reformer.