Acknowledging that surplus tax collections and federal aid have kept Massachusetts afloat through the darkest days of the pandemic, House leadership on Wednesday unveiled a nearly $50 billion budget for fiscal year 2023 that Speaker Ron Mariano said will reinvest in the state’s lower- and middle-class residents and gird the post-COVID economy for “tough times” in the future.

The House Ways and Means Committee’s budget recommendation, which totals $49.629 billion and is expected to be debated the week of April 25, would increase spending by $2.015 billion, or 4.23 percent over the current year’s budget, and proposes to spend $1.398 billion, or 2.9 percent, more than Gov. Charlie Baker recommended in his January budget filing.

In addition to the early education and workforce development initiatives that Mariano and Ways and Means Chairman Aaron Michlewitz rolled out Monday, the House budget would also boost local aid, fully fund the next year of the 2019 school finance reform law known as the Student Opportunity Act, eliminate communication costs for incarcerated people and their families, provide free school lunches for another year, and push the state’s stabilization fund to an estimated balance of $6.55 billion by the end of next June.

There is also $853 million for housing initiatives, including $150 million for the rental voucher program (an increase of $20 million over Baker’s budget plan), $140 million for the Residential Assistance for Families in Transition program ($60 million more than the governor proposed), and $100 million for homeless shelters.

Michlewitz said the budget his committee released “presents the commonwealth with a unique opportunity to invest in the middle class and start to tackle some of the challenges that a post-COVID economy has created.”

Massachusetts generated a surplus of more than $5 billion last fiscal year and is already running at least $1.5 billion ahead of expectations for this fiscal year. On top of tax revenue, the state still has more than $2 billion of American Rescue Plan Act money to put to use in the coming years and a record amount of money socked away in the stabilization fund.

The state’s strong revenue performance has led to a chorus calling for tax relief for residents who are also dealing with higher prices across the board, but Mariano and Michlewitz made clear Wednesday that they think the money will do more good if the Legislature spends it in a targeted way rather than putting it back into taxpayers’ pockets.