The Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, a business-backed budget watchdog, projected last week that lawmakers will have a surplus of nearly $3.6 billion from the fiscal year that ended last week, an amount it called “historic.” ...

The Department of Revenue is still counting, but the budget watchers at the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation expect that the Legislature will have a surplus of $3.6 billion when the final accounting of the fiscal year that ended last week is...

Fiscal year 2023 began on July 1st, but policymakers have yet to close the books on FY 2022 which requires disposing of a significant budget surplus. This Brief provides an estimate of the surplus and examines how it fits in to the larger fiscal...

The average cost of child care is more than $20,000 a year in Massachusetts, the most expensive state in the nation, only behind Washington, D.C., and well above the national average of $15,888, according to a recent report from the Massachusetts...

Budget conferees are negotiating spending, revenue and policy differences between the House and Senate proposals in order to present a final budget to Governor Baker for the start of fiscal year 2023. For the second straight year, conferees must also...

But as Ashley White, a researcher for the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, said, "It struggles even to serve all of those families." White pointed to February data showing more than 16,000 income-eligible children on waitlists for care in...

In a mobile business world, where smart workers can now do their jobs remotely from anywhere, will some choose to relocate to a place where the living is easier and the housing more affordable? That, said Eileen McAnneny, the president of the...

Last year, the business-backed Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation warned of the T’s revenue shortfall in years to come. MTF’s Vice President for Policy and Research Andrew Bagley, who authored the report on T finances, said the T either has to find...

“It won’t be the last headline that we read in that regard,” Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation President Eileen McAnneny said after the host of a forum on the state budget read a breaking news alert about the company’s plans. Companies are “much...

But erasing the gap is worth it for all of us. By one estimate, the racial wealth gap has cost the American economy $16 trillion over the last 20 years. Closer to home, the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation estimated that closing racial wealth gaps...