State tax collections over the first half of May were up nearly 12 percent over the same period in May 2022.
The $1.34 billion collected by mid-month was $141 million more than mid-month 2022 collections, Revenue Commissioner Geoffrey Snyder wrote in a May 18 letter.
“The month-to-date increases in withholding and non-withholding income tax, sales tax, and corporate and business tax were partially offset by a decrease in ‘all other’ tax,” Snyder wrote.
Department of Revenue officials caution against using mid-month revenues to assess trends or project future revenues.
Massachusetts collected $4.782 billion in taxes in April, a drop of $2.163 billion or 31 percent from the same month a year earlier and $1.435 billion or 23 percent below the most recent monthly benchmark projection. Through mid-April, total state tax collections of $1.597 billion were running $848 million or nearly 35 percent below collections during the same period in April 2022.
April tax collections left the state more than $700 million below what budget chiefs originally forecast Massachusetts would have hauled in by that point. Through March, revenues had been running roughly $870 million above the original benchmark pace.
