(WNY News Now) – Local sales tax collections showed a modest 1.4% increase in the third quarter, reflecting the slowest growth rate since the pandemic’s economic rebound, State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli reported today.
New York – Local government sales tax collections totaled $5.98 billion in the third calendar quarter (July-September) of 2024, an increase of 1.4%, or $82.7 million, compared to the same quarter last year, according to a report released today by State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli. Eight of the ten regions in the state, including New York City, saw collections rise.
“Local sales tax collections are growing more slowly than they were in the pre-pandemic period,” DiNapoli said. “Given this lower year-over-year growth, local officials should temper their expectations for future sales tax revenues.”
Local sales tax collections this past quarter continued a general trend of declining growth that followed a post-pandemic spike, with the third quarter’s 1.4% year-over-year growth the lowest quarterly increase since the pandemic-induced declines. Local sales taxes grew at an average quarterly year-over-year rate of 3.8% during the period of recovery and expansion following the Great Recession. The third quarter’s modest increase in local sales tax collections marked the sixth consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth below this pre-pandemic rate.
New York City’s 1.1% (or $28.2 million) increase in third quarter collections was less than the 3.2% and 3.3% increases in the first and second quarters, respectively. Despite this being the lowest growth in over three years, the city remains the largest contributor to local sales tax growth in the state.
Aggregate growth in third quarter collections for the counties and cities in the rest of the state was 1.5%, year over year. This relatively modest growth was the largest quarterly increase all year outside New York City.
On a regional basis, the Mid-Hudson and Long Island regions had the highest quarterly growth rates at 3.8% and 1.7%, respectively. Western New York and Central New York followed with growth of 1.5% each.
County collections, in aggregate, grew by 1.4% in the third quarter with 34 of the 57 counties outside of New York City seeing an increase.
Orleans County had the highest quarterly growth at 12.9%, followed by the counties of Rockland (9.3%), Hamilton (7.4%) and Schenectady (6.9%). Conversely, Allegany County saw the steepest decline at -10.2%, followed by Livingston (-5.8%), Schoharie (-4.7%) and St. Lawrence (-3.9%).
Twelve of the 18 cities that impose their own sales tax experienced growth in the third quarter compared to last year. Gloversville had the largest increase, 21.5%, followed by New Rochelle (8.9%) and Oswego (6.1%). Of the six cities that saw declines, Norwich experienced the steepest decrease at -14.7%.
Year to date, local sales tax collections statewide are up 1.7%, or $298 million, over the January-September period in 2023.
The State Comptroller’s office also updated the local sales tax sharing interactive map, which shows the percentage of local sales tax revenue that counties distribute to other local governments and provides individual summaries of how sales tax is shared among localities in each county.