What to expect from state legislatures in 2024

Anma Nawaz:

Repeated gridlock in Washington has brought about the rise of another power center in America, state legislatures.

Lisa Desjardins explores what to expect in the coming year.

Lisa Desjardins:

In 2024, lawmakers in statehouses from California to Kentucky are poised to wrestle with major issues in American life.

Joining us now to preview an important year ahead is Reid Wilson, founder of Pluribus News, which focuses on state-level news and policy.

Reid, we have heard a lot about deficits, national debt on the federal level. States have a bit of a different situation. Most of them have to have balanced budgets. But I want to ask you, what is the fiscal picture like? What are the bank accounts looking for states right now?

Reid Wilson, Founder, Pluribus News:

Well, there's good news and bad news.

This year, states are on track to spend $1.26 trillion, which is more than they have ever spent before. The bad news is that the good times are ending and the era of pandemic era massive budgets are fading a little bit as the federal money runs out. States are — most states are still taking in much more revenue than they did pre-pandemic.

There are some bleak spots. In California, they're in a $68 billion budget hole. The good news is that a lot of these states were anticipating a downturn, and they saved more money than they'd ever had before in their rainy day funds. So a lot of these states are set up to keep operating for half-a-year, nine months, an entire year without raising any additional revenue if the economy really turns south.

Lisa Desjardins:

But when I hear states looking at a little bit tighter of a budget picture, I also wonder about taxes.

Reid Wilson:

Yes, in some cases, legislators are starting to talk about raising taxes, but, in most cases, legislators are talking about cutting taxes still, especially in places Georgia, Florida.

We're likely to see more tax cuts this year because a lot of these states are still taking in much more revenue than they did before the pandemic. And because of things a booming housing market, property taxes are rising. And so legislators are reacting to that, trying to lower that property tax burden that's unexpectedly falling on their residents.

Lisa Desjardins:

From surveying the national landscape on the state level, what do you think is the biggest issue overall that you see across states?

Reid Wilson:

When I talk to legislators, almost no matter what issue we're talking about, the underlying issue is a work force issue.

The Baby Boomer generation is retiring. In its place, the Gen X, the Millennials and Gen Z, there aren't enough of them to fill those jobs. When I started covering states a decade-and-a-half ago, a lot of what I heard from governors was, hey, we stole this business from another state. We recruited this business successfully.

Now, when I'm talking to governors and legislators, they're talking about stealing workers and attracting workers successfully. That's an incredible sea change. And it speaks to the lack of employees there are to fill state government jobs, to fill teaching jobs. I mean, we see this when you walk into a restaurant and half the tables are empty because they don't have enough servers.

The same thing is happening in corrections, in high-tech manufacturing, basically any issue across the country. Governor Kristi Noem of South Dakota a couple of months ago said that basically the state that has the work force is going to win the future. I think she was exactly right.

Lisa Desjardins:

Huh.

One other thing about states is that most of them, most of the state legislatures in 2024 are either Republican-led, both chambers, or Democratic-led. I think there's just one, Pennsylvania, that in 2024 will have split chambers.

So I want to kind of break down the different agendas. When you look at those Democrat-led states, let's start with them. What do you think the agenda looks like in those legislatures?

Reid Wilson:

Well, I have been talking to state legislative leaders about their priorities over the next year in just the last few weeks. And a lot of them are telling me that they're going to be focusing on housing and homelessness, which are sort of twin crises that are working together.

There is simply not enough housing in America. It takes a long time to build all of that new stock. So in the sort of short run, states are going to be — the blue states are going to be working on things like rent stabilization, trying to keep more people in their homes and avoid an eviction crisis, like we avoided in the early days of the pandemic.

The second thing I think we will see is a lot of measures on gun safety, trying to limit assault-style weapons, high-capacity magazines. And the sort of key here is that all of these states are working under the new guidance of the U.S. Supreme Court, which has struck down a number of blue state gun safety laws in recent years.

They're trying to figure out what the justices will allow and just how far they can push some of this legislation.

Lisa Desjardins:

What about Republican states?

Reid Wilson:

In Republican states, I think we can focus a lot on those tax cuts that I talked about, teacher retention, work force retention, and health care retention, especially in a state like Florida.

The big initiative this year is going to be on trying to attract more health care workers to a fast-growing state that's older than the national average. There are going to be a lot of seniors in Florida who need that kind of care. So they're working on things like licensure reform. If you're a doctor or a registered nurse in one state, you move to Florida, your license can follow you there under a lot of the reforms that they have been talking about.

A lot of red states are working on that, that sort of licensure reform, because a surprising number of jobs require a professional license. They want to reduce the barriers to entry, make sure that you can take your job with you, effectively.

Lisa Desjardins:

It is all about the economy in 2024.

Reid Wilson, thank you so much.

Reid Wilson:

Thank you, Lisa.