Texas revenue for fiscal 2021, August sales tax collections

AUSTIN — Texas Comptroller Glenn Hegar today released totals for fiscal 2021 state revenues, in addition to announcing monthly state revenues for August.

• General Revenue-related revenue for fiscal 2021 totaled $60.5 billion, up 6.2 percent from fiscal 2020.
• All Funds tax collections were $61.47 billion, up 7.1 percent from fiscal 2020.
• Sales tax revenue was $36 billion, up 5.6 percent from fiscal 2020.
• Motor vehicle sales and rental tax revenue was $5.73 billion, up 19.0 percent from fiscal 2020.
• Franchise tax revenue was $4.53 billion, up 2.5 percent from fiscal 2020.
• Oil production tax revenue was $3.45 billion, up 6.8 percent from fiscal 2020.
• Natural gas production tax revenue was $1.57 billion, up 69.5 percent from fiscal 2020.
• All Funds revenue was $170.5 billion, up 20.4 percent from fiscal 2020, an increase attributable to federal funding for pandemic-related assistance.

“Yearly revenues were ahead of our projections in the revised Biennial Revenue Estimate (BRE) released in August,” Hegar said. “Motor vehicle sales and rental taxes and the natural gas production tax were particularly strong in the final month of fiscal 2021.”

The Economic Stabilization Fund (ESF) and State Highway Fund (SHF) both receive funding from oil and natural gas severance taxes. In November, the Comptroller’s office will deposit $1.46 billion in each of those funds, up from the $1.13 billion deposited in each fund in November 2020.

Hegar also said state sales tax revenue totaled $3.33 billion in August, 18.3 percent more than in August 2020. Year-over-year increases for most tax revenues continue to be affected by base effects: year-ago revenue collections to which this year’s collections are compared were suppressed by the pandemic.

The majority of August sales tax revenue is based on sales made in July and remitted to the agency in August.

“August state sales tax collections continued to surpass year-ago and pre-pandemic levels, with the rate of growth in receipts from non-retail sectors again outpacing that from retail trade,” Hegar said. “Receipts from oil and gas mining exhibited the largest percentage increase among major economic sectors for the second straight month, but remittances from that sector remained well below pre-pandemic levels. Construction and manufacturing returns both exhibited strong growth in August.

“The largest growth in retail receipts from year-ago levels was from clothing and clothing accessories stores. Bars and restaurants also showed robust growth compared to August of last year. Both sectors were substantially negatively impacted by the pandemic. Sectors that had increased sales following the onset of the pandemic – food and beverage stores, furniture and home furnishings stores, and sporting goods and hobby stores – had no growth in July compared to a year ago but did return to positive territory in August. Collections from other retail sectors that grew strongly last year – big box and online general merchandisers and building materials stores – continued to grow, but at a moderate pace.”

Total sales tax revenue for the three months ending in August 2021 was up 16.5 percent compared to the same period a year ago. Sales tax is the largest source of state funding for the state budget, accounting for 59 percent of all tax collections.

Texas collected the following revenue from other major taxes in August:

• motor vehicle sales and rental taxes — $625 million, up 33 percent from August 2020 (before May of this year, that source of revenue had never topped $500 million);
• motor fuel taxes — $331 million, up 15 percent from August 2020;
• oil production tax — $405 million, up 85 percent from August 2020;
• natural gas production tax — $215 million, compared to negative $15 million in August 2020, attributable to substantial refund payments in August a year ago;
• hotel occupancy tax — $65 million, up 112 percent from August 2020; and
• alcoholic beverage taxes — $135 million, up 96 percent from August 2020.