Comptroller Sean Scanlon recently declared that “the crisis is over” with respect to the state’s fiscal condition. While Connecticut has made significant progress in recent years, such a statement masks the state’s precarious position.
Connecticut has run surpluses for several years, paid down substantial amounts of debt, and found a much better footing than in 2017 when the fiscal guardrails—critical to that new-found financial and economic health—were first adopted.
However, we disagree that Connecticut has achieved its goal of reaching long-term fiscal stability.
The purpose of the guardrails—which ended more than a decade of budget deficits followed by damaging tax hikes—was to build resilience in our budget-making process, not simply pay down debt.
If we only use our debt payments as an indicator of progress, we overlook the precarity that remains in the state’s fiscal picture.
We can see this in two places: budget stress tests and annual debt payments.
Stress Test
When the Office of Policy and Management published its annual fiscal accountability report this year, its stress test showed that the state budget could withstand all but a severe recession akin to 2008.
However, the same analysis shows that without the existing volatility cap, the state’s rainy day fund would fail to absorb even a moderate recession scenario, and would barely hold on in a mild recession.
This illustrates Connecticut’s continued reliance on volatile revenues, and lawmakers must consider the implications of changing the volatility cap, with resilience in mind.
On the debt payments side, the fiscal guardrails allowed $11 billion in debt to be paid down, but annual debt payments remain substantial.
Without the volatility cap, the state’s rainy day fund would fail to absorb even a moderate recession scenario.
For fiscal 2026, policymakers budgeted $3.14 billion in payments toward unfunded pension liabilities for teachers and state employees.
Total “non-functional” costs were budgeted at $7.76 billion in 2026, or 31.4% of the General Fund. By comparison, lawmakers allocated only $2.27 billion for Education Cost Sharing grants, the primary mechanism for distributing K-12 education funding.
Within the pension systems, the Teachers’ Retirement System remains only 64% funded, while the State Employees Retirement System is 60% funded.
While funding levels for both systems are now at two-decade highs, they still rank among the worst-funded public sector pension systems in the country—highlighting how perilous Connecticut’s fiscal condition was less than a decade ago.
Guardrails Don’t Block Investments
Some argue that fiscal controls have meant forgoing investments elsewhere. However, Connecticut has expanded spending on social programs since the guardrails were put in place.
Between 2017 and 2025, General Fund spending grew 3.57% per year, while inflation grew 3.43% annually—meaning the General Fund grew in real terms.
This does not include “off-budget” increases to spending like the childcare trust fund or paid FMLA, both enacted during the guardrails era, nor municipal cost sharing, which was moved out of the budget.
The line item with the biggest growth was Medicaid, which grew $1.2 billion, or about 50%.
This represents the crux of the challenge for lawmakers. Spending continues to grow, but is primarily absorbed by healthcare costs that continue to rise faster than inflation.
As more resources are pulled in to programs like Medicaid, it leaves less available for other social purposes.
Pension payments also grew substantially, with contributions to state employee retirement benefits rising $511 million or 45%.
However, if not for the guardrails and additional deposits to the system, required pension contributions would have been $872 million higher.
It’s ironic that there are those who blame the guardrails for limiting spending, when the fiscal controls only enabled more spending on social programs.
Flexibility
Despite claims that the guardrails are inflexible, lawmakers have not found it difficult to work around them.
Since they were enacted, policymakers have moved hundreds of millions of dollars off budget, first with municipal payments, then with the ECE trust fund, and this year with supplemental hospital payments.
In fiscal 2025, municipal sharing and the ECE deposit represented nearly $1 billion in additional spending not captured by General Fund figures.
The Lamont administration also facilitated multiple changes to the volatility cap, which will capture more than $800 million in funds for use this year, one year after lawmakers permanently raised the cap.
That hardly sounds inflexible. Siphoning those funds away from pension liabilities however, adds billions of dollars more in pension payments in the decades to come and reduced resilience in the face of a downturn.
Connecticut’s per capita state spending is almost twice the national average.
What’s clear is that fiscal guardrails cannot substitute for fiscal discipline.
The lack of funds available for education, or Medicaid reimbursement, or even tax cuts, is not due to a lack of resources.
Money we used to create new programs could just have easily shored up existing ones, but that is not what policymakers chose to do.
We live in a world of unlimited wants and finite resources, and on the margins there will always be something not funded or ignored.
That is a reality of the world, but Connecticut should not sacrifice recent good habits for the sake of near term political wins.
What About Spending Reforms?
One issue too often ignored in this debate is government spending reforms—invariably, the focus is on finding more revenue, rather than reviewing and assessing state operations and programs.
There are concrete reform opportunities. Five years ago, the state legislature commissioned a report that recommended 200 reforms that would save taxpayers between $600 million and $900 million annually.
Consider state agency overtime spending, which has soared more than 55% in the last decade and is on track to hit a record high $336.2 million in fiscal 2026, with short- and long-term consequences for Connecticut taxpayers.
That 2021 spending reform blueprint noted that modernizing workforce management, capping pensionable overtime, and improving hiring processes and oversight of overtime and workers’ compensation practices “could generate $70 million to $100 million in cost savings and improve conditions for state employees.”
State agency overtime spending has soared more than 55% in the last decade, with short- and long-term implications for taxpayers.
Unfortunately the reform recommendations outlined in the report—which cost $2 million to produce—have gained little traction at the state Capitol, while government spending continues to soar every year.
Since 2020, annual state government spending has increased a stunning 29.6%, with state lawmakers adopting a record high $28.1 billion tax and spending plan for fiscal 2027.
HARTFORD, CT — About 25,000 state residents who are about to lose their federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits as a result of changes to eligibility will receive a little relief from the state, according to Gov. Ned Lamont.
On Wednesday morning, Lamont announced a plan to use $8.5 million from Connecticut’s Federal Cuts Response Fund to provide $300 grocery assistance cards to those losing their benefits.
“Connecticut will not stand by as the Trump administration uses hunger as a weapon against working families, veterans, and our most vulnerable,” Lamont said. “These new SNAP work requirements represent a cruel decision and fundamental shift away from the program’s core mission of ensuring our neighbors don’t go hungry.”
Lamont said he was particularly troubled by the decision to eliminate the exemption for veterans.
“We are providing this assistance as a bridge to prevent people from going hungry as we help them navigate these changes,” he said. “I hope that Congress will end the inhumane and immoral cuts that President Trump pushed for after Americans elect a new Congress this fall.”
Under the plan, eligible individuals who have recently lost SNAP eligibility due to federal changes in work requirements will receive a grocery assistance card that can be used to purchase food. While applying for benefits, applicants will be connected with services to help them regain SNAP eligibility where possible.
These benefits and services will be administered by the Connecticut Department of Social Services (DSS) through a partnership with the state’s network of community action agencies, which will assist with outreach, eligibility verification, and distribution of benefits. In addition to the grocery card funding, the plan includes $1 million for administrative costs related to the distribution of this aid and related services, according to Lamont’s office.
“No one in Connecticut should have to worry about putting food on the table because of a policy decision made in Washington,” DSS Commissioner Andrea Barton Reeves said. “This one-time grocery assistance will provide an immediate lifeline to thousands of our neighbors who are losing food benefits through no fault of their own.”
State Sen. Matt Lesser, D-Middletown, co-chair of the legislature’s Human Services Committee, called the administration’s cuts to social support programs devastating.
“The president just last week said he doesn’t care about families struggling with high gas and grocery prices,” Lesser said.
NEW HAVEN, CT — New Haven is among several cities across the state taking action against rising food costs and cuts to federal food assistance benefits by creating farm-to-table and community-based solutions.
Farm-to-table programs provide fresh produce [and] fresh food for people who deserve it most, said Gov. Ned Lamont at a recent event including CitySeed, a New Haven-based nonprofit connecting about 60 Connecticut farms to its farmers markets. The state will do whatever it can to aid communities like New Haven that are taking the initiative to address food insecurity, said Lamont.
In response to federal cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, CitySeed received funding from the Emergency State Response Reserve Funds and a grant from the Connecticut Department of Agriculture’s Local Food Purchase Assistance Grant Program to facilitate relationships between local farmers and food pantries.
Lamont met with city officials, CitySeed leaders and students from the nearby John S. Martinez Sea & Sky Magnet School for a tour of the organization’s ’s new property on 162 James St., an area of New Haven reported to have been especially impacted by SNAP benefit cuts.
Chrsitine Kim, who serves on both New Haven’s Board of Alders and CitySeed’s Board of Directors, said the new building would be used to uplift members of the community.
“What we are trying to build here is an opportunity upstream in the food system so that people can generate their own economic health [and] we can help our local farmers,” said Kim.
Local chefs like Kosarachi Okwunna, the owner of Kosy’s African Kitchen in New Haven, use the commercial kitchen to serve affordable and fresh food to the community, said Sarah Miller, CitySeed’s executive director.
“There’s a lot of potential for farm products to enter schools, restaurants [and] food pantries,” said Miller. “With the infrastructure support from the state … we’ve been able to really expand our capacity to offer market opportunities to farmers and to bring them to the city.”
Lamont said the programs were important because, while food insecurity afflicts people everywhere, cities have a tougher time getting fresh produce.
“That’s why programs like CitySeed are so important,” he said.
The state follows Maryland in enacting legislation that bars retailers from using personally identifiable data to customize prices. A similar bill is awaiting action by New York’s governor.
Dive Brief:
Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont last Thursday signed a bill that prohibits retailers from using personally identifiable data to customize prices for shoppers.
Also last Thursday, New York state lawmakers approved legislation that would bar retailers from using personally identifiable data to customize prices for shoppers. The bill now awaits a decision by Gov. Kathy Hochul.
Last Tuesday, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis vetoed a bill passed by lawmakers in the state that would have prohibited companies from using consumer data to generate individualized prices.
Dive Insight:
The legislation in Connecticut and New York reflects a mounting effort by politicians and advocacy groups to crack down on practices they claim are unfair to consumers.
Connecticut is the second state to enact a law that restricts how retailers can use information about their customers to set prices. In April, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore signed a bill that made the state the first in the country “to ban price manipulation practices driven by the ability to instantly spike prices based on surveillance data.” Maryland’s law is due to go into effect on Oct. 1.
Consumer Reports, which has championed efforts to restrict the use of data linked to individual shoppers to set prices, hailed the developments in Connecticut and New York last week. The organization pointed to data such as people’s online browsing histories, health conditions and income as examples of information it believes retailers should not be allowed to use to determine individualized prices.
Consumer Reports praised Connecticut’s law, which will go into effect on July 1, 2027, but urged the state to strengthen it, in part by making clear to consumers that they can take legal action on their own.
New York Attorney General Letitia James hailed the decision by state lawmakers to approve the bill, known as the One Fair Price Act. “This is a big victory in our fight to ban surveillance pricing and help make life more affordable in New York,” she said in a Friday statement on her office’s Facebook page.
If Hochul signs the bill, it would take effect six months later.
New York state lawmakers are also considering legislation that would prevent food retailers and pharmacies from using electronic shelf labels. James and a coalition including United Food and Commercial International Workers Union Local 1500, AARP New York, and the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union have called for the bill to be passed.
The failure to move dynamic pricing legislation forward in Colorado is a reminder of the challenges that these efforts face, however. In a letter to the Colorado State House of Representatives, Colorado’s governor said he rejected the legislation because it was too wide-ranging.
“I support policies to protect consumers from unethical price gouging and save Coloradans money. I am, however, troubled by the broad approach taken by [the bill] and worry about discouraging perfectly acceptable uses of technology to set an appropriate price or wage, or the use of technology to save consumers money through discounts that may not exactly fit within the bill’s definition of an acceptable discount,” Polis wrote.
Recent public testimony on proposed Senate Bill 04 and news articles about Electronic Shelf Labels (ESLs) in grocery stores highlighted a concerning gap between perception and reality. As affordability remains a top priority for families across our state, it’s essential that policy discussions are based on facts, not misinformation.
Let’s clear up the biggest misconception: that Connecticut grocery stores are using ESL technology for surveillance, price discrimination, or biometric tracking. That simply isn’t happening. No grocery store in Connecticut is using ESLs to target individual shoppers, nor are they considering it. Across our state, many stores use these innovative labels to display clear, consistent prices, not to track or discriminate against their customers.
Electronic Shelf Labels are exactly what the name suggests: digital shelf tags that show the same price to every customer in front of the shelf. They do not alter the price for one shopper compared to another. The price displayed on the shelf matches the price customers pay at the register, with no exceptions.
False claims that this technology secretly manipulates prices throughout the day misrepresent how grocery pricing works. Grocery retailers set prices through standard category management and promotional planning processes that happen well in advance. Promotions are scheduled, advertised, and applied consistently for all shoppers. ESLs simply ensure that when those pre-planned price changes happen, they are implemented accurately and simultaneously across the store.
They provide significant environmental and operational advantages. A typical supermarket might replace tens of thousands of paper shelf tags every week. Switching to digital shelf labels greatly reduces paper waste, printing, and transportation associated with traditional shelf tags. This reduction in paper use offers a clear and meaningful environmental benefit.
The fact is that digital technology enhances one of the most important protections consumers depend on: price accuracy. Connecticut enforces strict pricing laws through the Department of Consumer Protection’s Weights and Measures Division, and compliance is mandatory. In a typical supermarket with a wide variety of products and frequent price changes, ESLs remove the risk of human error entirely. By updating prices in real time and uniformly, ESLs ensure shoppers can trust that the shelf price matches the checkout price.
At the end of the day, anyone shopping in a grocery store deserves confidence that the price on the tag is the price they pay. Electronic Shelf Labels deliver exactly that more accurately, consistently, and transparently.
Food retailers and policy makers alike share a commitment to protecting consumers. However, good policy requires a clear understanding of how ESLs are actually being used, not speculation about what they might become. The real risk isn’t this technology; it’s policies that increase costs for businesses and the families who can least afford it.
President Trump’s tax cuts are delivering bigger refunds and smaller tax bills to high-income Democratic-leaning regions that didn’t vote for him.
Millions of taxpayers—largely those who earn between $150,000 and $600,000—are starting to reap the benefits of a change that lets them deduct far more of their state and local taxes, or SALT, from their federal taxable income. In last year’s tax law, Congress raised the cap for that deduction to $40,000 from $10,000.
That means people with high state income taxes and local property taxes can pay less to the federal government, and those people are concentrated in such states as New York, New Jersey and California.
So far this tax season, refunds for people in some higher-tax states have been growing faster than the national average, according to an analysis by Navy Federal Credit Union of member deposits.
In California, Virginia and Maryland, average refunds are up 21%, 13% and 12% from 2025, respectively, compared with an average of 11% nationally among the credit union’s members. In Florida and Texas, which voted for Trump, the increases have been more modest. Those states don’t have individual income taxes, and refunds are up just 6% and 5%, respectively.
Doris Christelis, a 62-year-old retiree in Sudbury, Mass., who identifies as “blue from a blue state,” is among those benefiting from the higher SALT cap. She said she can now deduct the nearly $24,000 that she and her husband pay in property taxes.
“I felt like it was a gift for having to put up with Trump,” she said.
The Trump administration backed the higher cap but isn’t highlighting it much during tax season. Instead, officials trumpet the new tax breaks for overtime pay, seniors and tipped workers.
Those matter to millions of people. But in dollars, SALT is the biggest new tax break for individuals and is expected to save taxpayers about $29 billion as they file returns this year. That is about as much as the overtime and tips deductions combined, according to a Piper Sandler analysis.
Kenneth Green, a 75-year-old higher-education consultant in Los Angeles, was able to deduct nearly $40,000 because of his state income taxes and the $13,000 he pays in property taxes.
That doesn’t necessarily make him a fan of Trump’s tax law, which included new tax breaks for middle-income Americans and extended expiring tax cuts that help high-income taxpayers. “It’s still clear that the beneficiaries of the Big, Beautiful Bill are folks whose incomes are way above mine,” Green said.
He will probably contribute part of his tax savings to a 529 college savings account for his granddaughter.
“It’s not the time to buy an airline ticket to go to Europe because of the cost of oil,” Green said.
Many Republicans would prefer to eliminate the SALT deduction, arguing that it is an unnecessary federal subsidy for big-spending state governments. But Republican control of the House is narrow, which allowed a handful of lawmakers—particularly those from the New York metropolitan area—to hold out for the higher cap.
The $40,000 SALT limit applies to married couples and singles alike. It is available only to those who itemize deductions, generally people with enough state and local taxes, mortgage interest and charitable contributions to exceed the standard deduction, which is $15,750 for individuals and $31,500 for married couples for this tax filing season. People can deduct property taxes and their state and local income or sales taxes.
The cap shrinks once income reaches $500,000 and is $10,000 for anyone with income of $600,000 or above. In many states, some business owners can use workarounds blessed by the federal government so that, in effect, they have no cap on deducting taxes on business income.
Trump and the Republicans created the $10,000 cap in their 2017 tax law, and it fueled frustration in high-tax states. Last year’s relaxation of the limit is a relief to taxpayers who have been consistently hitting that ceiling, though the cap reverts to $10,000 after 2029 unless Congress acts.
The higher SALT cap prevented Jorge Valladares Jr. of Newbury Park, Calif., from needing to write a check to the federal government. The retiree’s income increased to about $156,000 from $143,000, more than expected because of higher Social Security payments and required retirement-account distributions.
But an additional $5,000 in SALT deductions and the new deduction for senior citizens meant he and his wife got a $468 refund.
“I was very pleased with this tax bill, as you can imagine,” Valladares said. “It’s helping middle-class people.”
Some taxpayers made changes in 2025 to turbocharge the SALT break. Bunching deductions into one year helps people exceed the standard deduction. That opens the door for other potential itemized deductions like mortgage interest and charitable contributions.
Patrick Russell, a 37-year-old commercial banker in Austin, Texas, paid two years of property taxes last year. Combined with his family’s sales-tax deduction, including for a Tesla they bought, he was able to take $27,000 in SALT deductions.
With mortgage interest and charity, his household’s itemized deductions rose to almost $38,000. The higher SALT cap played into his decision to take out a second mortgage to finance a large backyard project, adding a sauna, an outdoor kitchen and garden. “That interest will be deductible,” he said.
Dan Rahman, a 69-year-old retired emergency-room physician in New York City, figures his refund was about $4,000 bigger this year because of the higher SALT cap. He isn’t planning any splurges.
“I’m saving it to pay for the increasing costs of living: home insurance, the electric bill, groceries,” he said. “No wild trips.”
A popular, yet controversial tax on sugary drinks, or a “soda tax,” was debated at the Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee’s public hearing on Monday, March 16.
The proposed bill, HB 5537, would require “each distributor [to] pay a tax on sweetened beverages, syrups and powders sold to a retailer for sale in the state of (A) two cents per fluid ounce of sweetened beverages, and (B) for syrups and powers intended for commercial or institutional use, two cents per fluid ounce of sweetened beverages that can be produced from each container of syrup or powder.”
The revenue derived from this tax would fund a program to give free school meals to every public school student in Connecticut.
An unhealthy diet is one of the highest risk-factors for chronic illnesses and premature deaths. Every year, around 124,000 people in the U.S. die from “preventable deaths” because of reasons related to “ultra-processed foods.”
A study sponsored by the American Heart Association found that around 80% of Connecticut residents supported a sugary beverage tax to fund universal free school meals.
A similar bill was proposed last year. Over time, that bill evolved from implementing a two-cent tax on sugary drinks to creating a working group to study how to fund free school meals for all Connecticut students. That bill died in the chamber.
And, in 2019, Gov. Ned Lamont proposed a 1.5-cent tax on sweetened drinks to fund school lunches. When that bill was proposed, his office estimated that it would bring in an additional $160 million in tax revenue. The state would need between $90 and $110 million to fund universal school lunches.
However, this estimate does not consider changes in consumer behavior.
A 2024 study that looked at five major cities across the U.S., including Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Seattle, found that the sale of sugary and sweetened beverages fell by 33% after sugar taxes between one and two cents per ounce were implemented.
“A tax like this could cost sales decline of up to 20% in those categories as consumers either buy less or shop across state lines, which is exactly what happened in Philadelphia,” Jordan Coe, the president and co-owner of Waverly Markets, said. “And when they cross state lines with their beverage purchases, they take their whole basket with them.”
The Legislative Director for Teamster Union New England Joint Council 10 said similar policies led to the reduction of work hours and job losses among union members in other states. And Scott Dolch, the CEO of the Connecticut Restaurant and Hospitality Association, predicted that a tax on sweetened drinks would harm the already-suffering hospitality industry.
And it would impact more than just soda.
A popular, yet controversial tax on sugary drinks was debated at the Finance Committee’s public hearing on Monday, March 16.
The proposed bill, HB 5537, would require “each distributor [to] [yay a tax on sweetened beverages, syrups and powders sold to a retailer for sale in the state of (A) two cents per fluid ounce of sweetened beverages, and (B) for syrups and powers intended for commercial or institutional use, two cents per fluid ounce of sweetened beverages that can be produced from each container of syrup or powder.”
The revenue derived from this tax would fund a program to give free school meals to every public school student in Connecticut.
A study sponsored by the American Heart Association found that around 80% of Connecticut residents supported a sugary beverage tax to fund universal free school meals.
Unhealthy diets are one of the highest risk-factors for chronic illnesses and premature deaths. Every year, around 124,000 people in the U.S. die from “preventable deaths” because of reasons related to “ultra-processed foods.”
A similar bill was proposed last year. Over time, that bill evolved from implementing a two-cent tax on sugary drinks to creating a working group to study how to fund free school meals for all Connecticut students. That bill died in the chamber.
And, in 2019, Gov. Ned Lamont proposed a 1.5-cent tax on sweetened drinks to fund school lunches. When that bill was proposed, his office estimated that it would bring in an additional $160 million in tax revenue. The state would need between $90 and $110 million to fund universal school lunches.
However, this estimate does not consider changes in consumer behavior.
A 2024 study that looked at five major cities across the U.S., including Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Seattle, found that the sale of sugary and sweetened beverages fell by 33% after sugar taxes between one and two cents per ounce were implemented.
“A tax like this could cost sales decline of up to 20% in those categories as consumers either buy less or shop across state lines, which is exactly what happened in Philadelphia,” Jordan Coe, the president and co-owner of Waverly Markets, said. “And when they cross state lines with their beverage purchases, they take their whole basket with them.”
The Legislative Director for Teamster Union New England Joint Council 10 said similar policies led to the reduction of work hours and job losses among union members in other states. And Scott Dolch, the CEO of the Connecticut Restaurant and Hospitality Association, predicted that a tax on sweetened drinks would harm restaurant owners in the state.
“I also think that trying to do bans and trying to tax might not be the solution we want for a healthy environment. We want people to choose; it is a choice,” Dolch said at the hearing. He went on to say, “There are other ways to find revenue, I don’t think adding new taxes to this industry should be one of them.”
There are exemptions in HB 5537 for 100% fruit juice and drinks packaged for personal use. But, as it is currently written, it would impact many alcoholic beverages, including cocktails and malt drinks, which includes almost all beers.
“Unlike other beverages, the alcoholic beverage industry is heavily regulated and heavily taxed. We pay taxes that no other product pays: federal excise tax, state excise tax, state sales tax. That is not the case with soft drinks and other sweetened beverages. We have entire sections of our general statutes that are dedicated to the regulation and taxation of alcoholic beverages,” Larry Cafero, the executive director of Wine and Spirits Wholesalers of Connecticut, said. “I believe this tax, which would be imposed at the distributor level and certainly passed on to the retail level, will become a cocktail tax.”
This “unnecessary” tax would hurt family-owned businesses, packaging stores and other businesses that are suffering because of a decrease in alcohol consumption, Cafero said.
But Rep. Moira Rader (D-Guilford) doesn’t think this is necessarily a bad thing.
“This is one of the things that’s kind of been proven to have a really positive double-edged sword, where you reduce the consumption of the very beverages that really cause a lot of public health issues, and you also really support public education and the kids in those buildings, and their food insecurity and the food insecurity of their families,” she said. “It has this very large ripple effect.”
Yet that is exactly what SB 438, a bill currently moving through the Labor Committee, would do. The proposal aims to restrict the use of self-checkouts in grocery stores and mandates how food retailers staff their checkout lanes.
It is mainly promoted through cooked-up claims by the United Food and Commercial Workers union.
Unfortunately, many of these claims do not reflect the complexity of a grocer’s operations or the preferences of Connecticut shoppers. At its core, SB 438 seeks to regulate how roughly 300 grocery stores across Connecticut manage their checkout operations as they serve millions of customers every week.
Grocery stores operate in a fast-paced environment where staffing needs fluctuate hour by hour based on customer traffic and demand. Imposing rigid staffing mandates removes the operational flexibility retailers need to serve customers efficiently. Supporters argue that retailers promote self-checkout mainly to reduce labor costs. However, the truth is simpler: consumers are opting for it.
Today, about 60 percent of transactions in many grocery stores happen at self-checkout stations, mainly because shoppers with just a few items prefer the speed and convenience. Stores keep both traditional staffed registers and self-checkout lanes so customers can choose the option that suits them best.
Another argument is that self-checkout contributes to retail theft and decreases state sales tax revenue. While retail theft is a serious problem, it’s not exclusive to self-checkout, and the grocery industry is already working with policymakers to combat organized retail crime through targeted legislation and better loss-prevention strategies.
Concerns about underage purchases of alcohol or tobacco at self-checkout are unfounded. These claims are simply incorrect. When alcohol is scanned at a self-checkout, the transaction pauses immediately and an employee must verify identification before it can proceed. Tobacco products are not available at self-checkout lanes; they are only sold at staffed service counters. The claim that self-checkout is cutting jobs is just as misleading.
Grocery jobs haven’t disappeared; they’ve adapted with technology and shifts in shopping habits.
Modern supermarkets now hire workers in roles that barely existed ten years ago, such as curbside pickup, online order fulfillment, home delivery coordination, and expanded food service offerings.
What SB 438 actually does is simple: raise operating costs for businesses by imposing strict staffing requirements that don’t align with actual customer demand. Those increased costs translate into higher prices for consumers at checkout. And there is another important point. Issues related to staffing levels and job responsibilities have traditionally been addressed through collective bargaining between employers and unions, not through legislation that dictates how businesses must organize their operations.
Connecticut lawmakers should be focused on policies that improve affordability, strengthen businesses, and give consumers more choices. SB 438 moves the state in the opposite direction. Instead of making groceries more accessible, it would make them more expensive and shopping for them less convenient. For Connecticut families already feeling the strain of rising food costs, it is a step in the wrong direction.
When Connecticut lawmakers exited the state Capitol at the end of the 2025 session, they left behind some unfinished business, particularly around the state’s plan for regulating companies’ use of artificial intelligence, ensuring data privacy and establishing consumer protections around emerging technologies.
For a second year in a row, legislators were unable to agree on the direction of state AI policy, with pro-regulation lawmakers in the state Senate and the more regulation-shy Lamont administration disagreeing over the best course of action.
In the months since, the question of what Connecticut should do about AI has only become more pressing. In December, the Trump administration issued an executive order in the hopes of discouraging states from regulating the technology. Meanwhile, a growing number of businesses are incorporating artificial intelligence into their operations, and investment in the global AI market has reached hundreds of billions of dollars.
Without federal legislation, state legislatures — in Connecticut and elsewhere — are facing pressure to address everything from the ethics of AI use to the environmental impact of data centers and concerns over a dot com-like “bubble.”
And as “generative AI” — programs that use datasets and already-available information to power technologies like ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, and Microsoft’s Copilot — is increasingly used in everyday life, the task facing regulators is only getting more complicated.
So far, few states have reached common ground on how to write the rules.
Pro-regulation lawmakers have proposed a wave of new measures, arguing that guardrails on the rapidly-changing technology will provide necessary protection to constituents worried about losing their privacy and intellectual property.
Opponents say the ever-growing list of AI “dos and don’ts” could have a chilling effect on local economies, curbing AI adoption and encouraging technology companies and innovation-focused businesses to move to friendlier markets.
In Connecticut, the debate is unfolding just as state economic development officials launchmultiple efforts to invest in artificial intelligence and emerging technologies, likening the initiative to a second industrial revolution.
With the 2026 legislative session quickly approaching, state lawmakers believe that the coming months provide a chance to define how Connecticut will approach the technology moving forward. Leaders of last year’s regulation efforts say the state can’t afford to miss its next chance.
“There’s definitely a debate over how strong our AI laws should be,” said Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff, D-Norwalk. “But I will tell you that if you talk to average people on the streets, they’re very concerned about AI and how it’s going to impact them.”
Lawmakers are gearing up for another swing at AI regulations
The Connecticut General Assembly’s record on passing AI-related measures is mixed. In recent years, state lawmakers have been able to push through a number of proposals, including data privacy regulation, new funding for AI training and education programs, and the criminalization of deepfake revenge porn.
Efforts to pass comprehensive legislation have been harder to get over the finish line.
Take Senate Bill 2, a wide-ranging proposal that sought to regulate how businesses use artificial intelligence in various ways, calling for the Department of Economic and Community Development to create a “regulatory sandbox” and seeking to limit the effects of algorithm-based discrimination. The bill was supported by Democratic leadership in the state Senate, and first emerged in 2024 after a state task force released a 255-page report on AI.
Gov. Ned Lamont opposed the bill, arguing that the measure would contribute to a fractured landscape of state AI regulations. State officials also suggested that lawmakers were acting too early, potentially scaring off future innovation in Connecticut.
Ultimately, S.B. 2 was amended to remove many of the business-related provisions and completely pulled references to algorithmic discrimination. While the amended bill passed the Senate with bipartisan support, the measure did not receive a vote in the House before the end of last year’s session.
For supporters of the legislation, the failure was frustrating, especially after last-minute amendments shifted the bill away from some of its original intent for the sake of broader appeal. “The bill had changed and become, I would say, more scaled back in the protections,” said state Sen. James Maroney, D-Milford, the author of Senate Bill 2 and a leading voice in the legislature on data privacy and AI.
“By the end of last year, [S.B. 2] was more of a disclosure bill, to use if AI was being used to make an important decision about your life,” he said.
In a December interview with the Connecticut Mirror, Maroney outlined his views on the state’s AI needs. He noted that he is far from an opponent of artificial intelligence, instead casting his desire for regulation as supporting the guardrails that will help structure the state’s future innovation efforts.
He said last year’s proposal would have provided those guardrails by accomplishing a multifaceted goal: “protecting” state residents, “promoting” responsible AI development, and “empowering” state government to use AI in ways that will benefit constituents.
Senate lawmakers intend to continue their efforts to “protect, promote, and empower” this year, planning a package of data privacy and consumer protection reforms alongside support for AI training and workforce development. One such bill has already been announced: a ban on facial recognition software in retail stores.
Both Maroney and Duff, the bill’s expected sponsors, said the measure was inspired by news that Wegmans Food Markets, a popular grocery chain, is using facial recognition software at some of its locations, including in its New York City grocery store. While the company said it’s not sharing the data with any third parties, the news still sparked concern over the use and storage of biometric data.
“The facial recognition and the biometrics and voice recognition, I think, are issues that are really much different than a camera looking for a shoplifter,” Duff said.
The bill’s sponsors say they hope to enact the ban before facial recognition software becomes widely used in the state. Earlier in January, reporting from CT Insider found that ShopRite, a New Jersey-based grocery chain with several locations in Connecticut, was using facial recognition software in several local stores.
As new legislation comes into shape, businesses in CT are wary
A spokesperson for the governor said he wants to focus on regulations that “protect the privacy and safety of Connecticut residents.”
“Governor Lamont continues to be supportive of any measures that protect the safety of residents when using AI, as well initiatives to upskill AI research and job training,” Rob Blanchard, Lamont’s spokesperson, said in an emailed statement. “While the federal landscape surrounding AI regulation continues to evolve, the Governor will continue to prioritize safety and education.”
State lawmakers who support regulating AI and data privacy told the Connecticut Mirror that their efforts are about ensuring state residents can engage with artificial intelligence on their own terms. In their view, regulation is both commonsense and necessary, and does not have to result in serious negative impacts for local businesses.
Some business leaders see things differently. The Connecticut Business and Industry Association, the state’s largest trade group, has been critical of efforts to strongly regulate AI use, arguing that at a time when the economy is stagnant, energy and other costs continue to impact companies, and small business owners voice concern and frustration over the state’s business climate, new AI policy could hinder innovation.
The adoption of new regulations on businesses, “puts us at much more of a risk of being a less business-friendly state, and can really impact investment in the state, and the ability for small businesses to want to operate here in the state,” said Chris Davis, CBIA’s vice president of public policy. “That can really hinder willingness to take advantage of the beneficial sides of artificial intelligence, the efficiencies that improve productivity and increase tax revenue for the state and really grow our economy.”
Davis said his concerns largely boil down to three points. First, there is a concern that proposed regulations in the state are blurring the lines between artificial intelligence and data privacy, creating a consistent “creep” of new regulations.
Next is the question of how the state might enact and enforce policies, particularly algorithmic discrimination and the use of impact assessments to track business employment outcomes.
Research has found that because of how AI gathers and uses already available information, some of which can contain biased and inaccurate data, AI systems can produce outputs that reinforce discrimination against marginalized communities. That can cause harm to people based on their age, race, and gender. Debate around the topic is currently making its way through the courts as a lawsuit, Mobley v. Workday, which challenges some AI-based hiring systems as being discriminatory.
Concerns over AI bias were a component of last year’s legislative debate, with some lawmakers arguing that failing to address algorithmic bias would leave a massive “hole” in any state legislation.
Addressing algorithmic bias has proven to be a major focus in statehouses; measures in more than 20 states were introduced in 2025.
The push to address algorithmic discrimination through specific and repeated assessment was of particular concern to businesses in Connecticut, Davis said, because it suggested that “every business is discriminating unless they can somehow prove that they’re not.” Davis said federal policy and state law — the Connecticut Fair Employment Practices Act, in particular — already require businesses not to discriminate.
Ultimately Connecticut lawmakers removed references to algorithmic discrimination from last year’s bill.
Davis’ final concern is the direct result of the other two: that by creating a wave of new regulations and then requiring businesses to keep track of how they are complying with them, the state could inadvertently limit AI growth by creating a system that is overly complicated, expensive and mired in paperwork.
Some of these concerns, along with a growing business interest in having input on new state policies, are part of why CBIA recently launched a Technology Council, a group that will review and offer business industry perspectives on proposed state technology policy. The group is expected to be active in the coming year.
Davis declined to discuss the pending facial recognition bill or other possible legislation that could emerge in the session, noting CBIA would prefer to comment after bills are introduced. Still, he said he hopes lawmakers will avoid enacting anything too rigid so that businesses have flexibility.
“We’re in a situation where we need to be able to find ways to be more productive and more efficient here in the state,” he said. “And AI has that opportunity.”
Chris Davis, vice president of public policy for the Connecticut Business and Industry Association, speaks with State Treasurer Erick Russell and former state Sen. John McKinney at the organization’s 2024 Economic Summit and Outlook. Credit: Courtesy of / CBIA
States are leading the way on AI regulation. The federal government wants to change that.
Asked about the ideal form of AI regulation for the business community, Davis said business and industry concerns are largely rooted in the piecemeal nature of state action. If each state adopts differing levels of regulation around AI and data privacy measures, that would make it difficult for businesses and consumers alike to navigate issues across state lines.
More specifically, there is concern that Connecticut could end up on the stricter side of the regulatory divide, and that companies looking for looser standards might move somewhere else. This is part of why S.B. 2 proved controversial last year, and was a factor in why the pro-business Lamont voiced his preference for other states to take the lead on adopting AI regulations.
The earliest adopters of comprehensive AI regulation have also run into their own troubles.
Colorado — for one — has emerged as a sort of national test case. In 2024, the state enacted the Colorado Artificial Intelligence Act, a comprehensive regulatory measure that addressed algorithmic discrimination. The law was the first broad measure approved at the state level, and the Colorado bill has been viewed as a model that could potentially influence other states looking to adopt regulations.
The fairly new law continues to be a source of controversy ahead of its expected implementation later this year, with supporters and opponents remaining at odds as the state braces for higher than expected implementation costs. Colorado lawmakers are currently looking to revise the law in the current 2026 session.
The continued discussion and delays in Colorado offer an early lesson: that lawmakers in other states will need to establish a variety of technical standards, from concise regulatory definitions, to easily navigated financial frameworks, and clearly-structured review processes for businesses if they hope to adopt comprehensive AI regulation.
At this point, many states seem more interested in adopting smaller, more incremental bills over large legislative packages. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, almost every state considered an AI or consumer privacy bill in 2025, with further action expected in statehouses this year.
For now, Connecticut also seems likely to take a more targeted approach in 2026, and early discussions at the start of the session seem likely to focus on data privacy.
“Whenever you bring up privacy issues, there’s a lot of things that we can talk about,” Duff said.
As Connecticut lawmakers work through these questions, the federal government is looking to have its own say on state AI efforts. The Trump administration’s December executive order warned states away from AI regulations, arguing that a patchwork of regulation could negatively affect interstate commerce. The administration instead supported a “carefully crafted national framework”, a singular federal standard establishing national rules on AI and related consumer protections.
The order also threatened to pull back leftover broadband deployment funds from states that have passed “onerous” laws around AI.
President Donald Trump signs an executive order relating to AI in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, Jan. 23, 2025, in Washington. Credit: Ben Curtis / AP Photo
Still, federal efforts to cut off state legislation may not have much of a chance. “A lot of the things in the executive order are — I don’t want to say they’re not enforceable, but they don’t actually do that much,” said Gowri Ramachandran, the director of elections and security for the Brennan Center for Justice, a legal and policy think thank housed at New York University’s School of Law. She notes that state AI laws are likely on solid legal ground, adding that the administration lacks the power to directly take legal action against state measures.
In Connecticut, lawmakers supporting new regulations say that in the absence of federal leadership, it is up to states to help put boundaries on artificial intelligence technologies. “Based on past precedent, there will not be a national standard,” said Maroney, who joined Duff and other state lawmakers in signing a letter criticizing the president’s AI executive order last month. “We haven’t seen any federal laws between 1998 and last year.”
And as AI technology stands to see increased adoption in the near future, legislators say waiting any longer would be a mistake.
“By not addressing or regulating in some way, shape, or form artificial intelligence, we make the same mistake that we did 30 years ago, when we did not put any kind of regulation or boundaries around the internet,” Duff said. “That’s a mistake to our society, to our country.”
Annual one-day event that gathers CPG/wholesale-focused food & beverage brands and other key stakeholders in Connecticut’s food industry.
The Big Connecticut Food Event is an annual one-day event that gathers CPG/wholesale-focused food & beverage brands and other key stakeholders spanning the Connecticut food entrepreneurship ecosystem to network, share ideas, and showcase products and services.
Our goal is to support the development of the state’s entrepreneurship pipeline so it produces multiple food and beverage brands each year that exceed $2mil in annual sales.
The upcoming Big Connecticut Food Event will take place on Saturday 4/18/26 at the Yale School of Management in New Haven. The event is free to attend, but advance registration is required.
Event content
💰Pitch competition featuring emerging and scaling Connecticut-based brands
🥫 Sampling and tabling from 20+ Connecticut brands and solutions providers
🤝 One-on-one coaching sessions between brands and industry experts
🎤 Panel discussions with industry leaders
Agenda
A detailed final agenda will be published soon. The morning of the event will be devoted to industry-facing coaching sessions and panels. The afternoon of the event will include tabling, sampling and the pitch competition.
