Seal of Louisiana Louisiana

Louisiana has a constitutional tax and expenditure limit enacted by legislative referendum in 1985 and amended several times throughout the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. The TEL is covered in Article 7 Sections 2 and 10 of the Louisiana State Constitution. The TEL limits taxes and expenditures to personal income growth and can be overridden by a supermajority vote.  This TEL also  allows numerous exemptions including debt service, allocations, retirement contributions, education spending, grants, “any monies not required to be deposited in the state treasury as provided in Article VII Section 9,” and payments towards deficits at the end of the fiscal year.

 
The base year represents the year the hypothetical Taxpayer's Bill of Rights (TABOR) would have been enacted. Selecting a base year changes how the state’s TABOR is calculated because the annual growth rates of inflation and population change depending on when TABOR is enacted.
  • Year Inflation-adjusted Actual Spending
    1992 14,217,948,780
    1993 14,625,960,250
    1994 16,312,210,650
    1995 18,165,042,930
    1996 15,996,685,190
    1997 17,199,652,170
    1998 17,108,347,800
    1999 17,789,530,130
    2000 16,626,192,360
    2001 18,255,000,130
    2002 18,271,452,230
    2003 19,202,626,460
    2004 11,692,149,000
    2005 18,044,889,680
    2006 20,380,293,810
    2007 19,852,993,790
    2008 20,828,434,330
    2009 22,247,143,210
    2010 25,416,520,030
    2011 25,297,560,250
    2012 20,220,204,860
    2013 22,489,911,770
    2014 21,839,218,070
    2015 22,650,092,010
    2016 21,819,189,060
    2017 20,032,034,570
    2018 21,796,084,390
    2019 18,783,931,760
    2020 18,286,048,480
    2021 19,293,661,450
    2022 21,331,492,500
*All spending figures are in inflation-adjusted 2022 dollars.